I AM all alone, this evening, and my thoughts I have fled to the scenes of childhood. Should you like to know what is just now occupying my mind, and what in heart I am looking at so intently? I see a child of about five or six years of age. It is her bedtime, and the ever attentive mother has bidden the little maiden goodnight, after having, as usual, first listened to the little one’s evening prayer, Rosie had a happy home; she lived in a town, but her father had a large garden, and there, in the beautiful summer weather, Rosie and her five brothers enjoyed plenty of play. Mr. and Mrs. C—, the father and mother of these children, were both Christians, so that frequently ministers of the gospel and other good people were visitors at the home of little Rosie. She had been taught to read by her mother, and could read a chapter pretty fluently by the time she was four years of age, before she could speak quite plainly.
Rosie had also been taught to believe that God hears and answers prayer. She herself had often read the very words of Jesus Himself, “Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you.” So, upon this particular night, on which the eye of my mind is gazing, I see the child get out of bed after she is left alone, and, kneeling down, clasp her hands and, with an earnest expression upon her young face, pray, “Oh, good God, up in heaven, the Bible says, Ast, and it shall be diven you, and whatsoever you ast in faith, believing, ye shall ‘ceive; now, great God, I want a big doll, like the one I saw down the town; please let me find her on the pillow when I wake in the morning ’cause I do believe, Oh, God Let me have the doll, for Trist’s sake. Amen.”
The little girl arose from her knees and got into bed, “quite sure, certain, and positive,” to use her own expression. She really believed, without a doubt, that the doll would be upon her pillow in the morning, and so, with a contented mind, she fell asleep.
Morning dawns at length, and Rosie awakes with the feeling all of us have known at one time or another, a strange feeling that something unusual is about to happen; the child rubs her eyes, and sits up and stares eagerly around. “Oh! I know,” says she, with a happy smile; “my new doll!” A look of blank surprise crosses Rosie’s face as she looks around and sees nothing on the pillow. The child examines every crevice of the bed, and every chair and table, as well as every corner of the room, and indeed everywhere that a dolly could lie. Rosie did not for one moment doubt that God heard prayer, and yet here was a problem she could not at all solve; no amount of rubbing her little eyes or puzzling her young brain could make her understand it, and so overwhelmed was she with disappointment, deep, and real, and bitter, that she sobbed in very misery, not loudly, but with a sort of heartbreak very painful in a young child, and with her head buried in the bedclothes. The child’s thoughts, if uttered, would be something like the following: “I am sure Jesus did say, Ask, and it shall be given you: and yet I have asked, and it is not given, and, oh, dear! my mamma says God cannot tell lies, and the Bible is all true, and I read only yesterday, ‘Whatsoever ye ask in faith, believing, ye shall receive.’ I am sure I did believe for certain that I should have the doll, and it is not here. Oh, dear! oh, dear! But perhaps mamma or Mary has been in the room and taken it away.” And as this thought occurred to Rosie she stopped sobbing, and pulled away at the bell, which soon brought the nurse up stairs.
“Oh, Mary,” asked Rosie, “have you taken from my pillow a nice, big, new doll?”
“Why, whatever is the matter, and what are you talking about, child?” replied Mary; “you have been dreaming.”
“What is dreaming?” asked the poor child, pitifully.
“It is fancying something that is not true,” answered the nurse.
“Oh, Mary, do go away, and send mamma. I’m so miserabubble,” and the little girl began to cry again. Mary evidently could not enter into her trouble, and felt inclined to laugh at her distress; but she quickly fetched the mother, who for some time could not comprehend the meaning of her little daughter’s sobbing ejaculations. “Oh, mamma! I did believe, and it isn’t true! It can’t be true. Oh, dear! Oh, dear! Oh, dear!” The doubting God’s truth was the worst trouble of all to the child.
At last Mrs. C—so far pacified Rosie as to be able to get from her the cause of her grief; and then, in the gentlest manner, she tried to bring to a child’s comprehension the facts that God is our loving Father, and that His word is always true, but that He does not always give us just the very things we ask for. He is so much greater and wiser than we are, that of course He knows best what is good for us, and will always give us the very best things possible, if we leave Him to choose for us. “But,” continued Rosie’s mamma, “if the Bible promises us bread, God will always give us bread, if we believe and ask for it. The text does not promise a new doll, yet, if it is the will of your Father in heaven, Rosie dear, He will give you a new doll, when He thinks proper, how and when He pleases; we must leave that to His wisdom, darling. My little child must trust in God to do what He thinks best, and leave it all to Him, just as she trusts in me to give her what food I think proper every day. So now, Rosie, you must ask your Father in heaven to forgive all the naughty, unbelieving thoughts His little girl has been thinking about His holy word, and then, darling, go to sleep again, or you will have a bad headache.”
Rosie did as her mother desired. Shall we listen to her prayer? “Oh, good, great God, forgive me for thinking the Bible was not always true; and if it is best for me, please let me have a nice, new big doll someday, when you want me to have it, for Jesus Trist’s sake. Amen.”
That picture of the past ends just there; would my young readers like a sequel to it? Some months had passed away, and Rosie was busy at play with her brothers, when she was called into the parlor to see a visitor.
“Come here, Rosie, and see what this lady has brought you. What have you to say for it?” said Rosie’s mamma, holding up to her child’s delighted eyes a beautifully dressed doll, quite as large as a baby in long clothes. Rosie came shyly forward, speechless; but with glistening eyes she took the treasure, and then, abruptly turning towards the visitor, she proved her gratitude by a sudden and tremendous hug, which went a long way towards squeezing the breath out of the kindhearted little body who had brought the doll. The lady in question was always doing some kind action or speaking some kind word to the young, and my mind’s eye now sees her making the heart of the little child dance with joy, and I see also the cheeks of little Rosie flush with pleasure and excitement, as she clasps her long-wished-for dolly to her bosom, and endeavors to thank the kind giver in a becoming manner: but the child could find no words, for it was just the very sort of doll for which she had prayed months before, and had almost given up hoping for. Rosie kept the large doll many, many years, and never forgot the kind lady or the prayer answered after many days.
Dear children, will you allow me to ask, Do you ever pray? If not, begin at once. Tell God all you want. First receive Christ into your heart, by believing His word that He died to save you. Then believe that because He lives, you shall live also. Then tell Him all your desires, both for the body and the soul, leaving God to answer in His own way.
RHODA.