One afternoon while visiting a sick man in the little village hospital, I noticed a new occupant in one of the beds. Seeking to show my interest in the stranger, I expressed to him my sympathy and was told he had a badly fractured thigh. I said: "I am sorry you have met with this accident. It is a sad business when the husband and father is laid aside.”
He turned his face towards me with a bright smile, and replied: "Ah, but I am well provided for; I have long ago made provision.”
His smile was so happy that I thought there must be a deeper meaning in the words― that his must be a divine certainty. To confirm the thought I said, "Well provided for? I am glad; but is it for time or for eternity?”
"Well, come to think of it, it's for time; I have two insurance policies.”
"And what provision have you made for eternity?" I asked.
"For eternity?" He repeated my question. "Why, I hadn't thought of that! Nothing, I guess.”
I sat down by the little bed, and looking him earnestly in the face, said: "What! Two sources of insurance for time, and nothing for eternity? Yet time is so short, and eternity forever. My friend, does not this seem folly?”
"Well, so it might be, now you put it in that way." "Indeed, it is madness. Only think, you had two policies to fall back on when you broke your leg; but if that accident had brought death to you, you had no provision― nothing for eternity! I have not the gray hairs that you have, but, thank God, many years ago, through His grace, I made my provision for eternity. Let me beg of you to do the same.”
Thoughtfully the answer came. "Yes, you are young and I am growing old. I guess it is high time I began to think of another world. But then, you see, I have always been a very temperate man and lived honestly and I think I have as good a chance of going to heaven as anyone. I'm what one would say thoroughly respectable.”
"How strange," I remarked gravely, "that God does not say one word in His Book about thoroughly respectable people getting to heaven!”
The injured man looked uneasy and fidgeted in his bed. Then he said, "I'm no Bible student, but I guess God would find more good than bad in me. As I get older, I'll just turn over a new leaf and tell the Lord I am sorry for the old. After all that, one might be sure of getting to heaven.”
"You told me a few moments ago that being a thoroughly respectable, honest, temperate man gave you a good chance of heaven. Now you talk of some day turning over a new leaf and being sorry for your old ways. That means that you acknowledge that you are a sinner, after all.
"Now what do you think your turning over a new leaf, as you call it, will do as before God? Will your being sorry blot out any one of your sins? If you had run up a bill at the baker's, which you were quite unable to pay, would your telling him you were sorry you had got into his debt take that debt out of his books and set you free?”
"No, to be sure it would not.”
"And do you think God is going to be less just as to His accounts than a tradesman of this world? Depend upon it, you have 'come short' in all His claims upon you. He has offered you a policy― the only policy that can make you safe for time and for eternity. This policy was written, signed and sealed in the precious blood of Christ Jesus, His Son, at the cross of Calvary. It insures your present peace, for 'He has made peace by the blood of His cross'; it takes care of every burden in your daily life, as He states: 'Casting all your care upon Him, for He careth for you'; and it assures you of a glorious entry into His presence at the end of life's journey, according to His promise: 'He is able to save to the uttermost them that come unto God by Him.'
"Now will you not accept God's insurance policy offered to you in His Word? It is all paid for, and only awaits your acceptance. How can you refuse it.”
The poor man was now squirming and groaning, whether with pain in his injured leg or with a sorely pricked conscience I know not. But as I rose to go he reached out his hand, and with tear-dimmed eyes he stammered: "Oh, I need that policy! I never felt that need before. And I do want Him as my insurance of salvation now and forever.”
When I left his bedside that afternoon, it was with full confidence that by God's grace another soul had fully subscribed to God's wondrous plan and received His assurance of salvation.
"Verily, verily, I say unto you,
He that believeth on Me
(Jesus) hath everlasting life.”
AUGUST