Lottie first came to my Sunday afternoon class when she was four years old. Even then, the chubby, fair-haired child sat eagerly listening to the simple, heart-winning story of Jesus and His love. Why should we doubt its power to win the young and tender heart, even at so early an age as Lottie’s then was? I am certain that it was at one of these first afternoon “talks” about Jesus dying on the Cross for sinners, that the dear child was really saved, for the new life was manifest, and we could not help seeing it. She was exceedingly fond of the hymns, and her favorite was,
“Shall we gather at His coming,
When the dead in Christ arise?
Shall we hear the Saviour’s summons,
To God’s Home beyond the skies?”
Her clear, sweet voice could be heard above all the rest when we reached the chorus,
“Yes, we’ll gather at His coming,
His glorious, His glorious coming;
Gather with His saints at His coming,
If washed in the Saviour’s blood.”
One afternoon I missed Lottie, and, on making inquiry, I learned that she was ill and in bed. I hastened to see my little scholar, and found her tossing in a fever. Lottie’s home was not a palace; only a small room up a long, dark stair, where the light of the sun scarcely shone. Her father was a laborer at the quay, and her mother, in order to help to support herself and Lottie, took in sewing. I fear her father spent most of his spare hours, and his money as well, in the saloon. When he came home in the evening, and found Lottie lying ill in bed, he was very much alarmed, and, no doubt, a good deal ashamed at being so neglectful of his little girl. When Lottie saw her father looking so dejected and miserable, she smiled and said,
“Come, daddy,” stretching out her arms to embrace him. He kissed her, and a big tear fell on her cheek, “Do not cry, daddy,” whispered Lottie, “I am going to the happy land, to Jesus’ country. Jesus is so good and kind, He will be waiting for me. Mamma’s coming, and I wish you would come too, daddy.”
This was more than the miserable man could bear. He covered his face with his hands and sobbed aloud. His sins against God, his neglect of his wife and child, pierced him like arrows, and that word from the lips of his sick, and apparently dying child, was God’s message to his hardened heart. It woke the first sense of sin and shame, and the Spirit deepened it into real conviction of sin before God. He sat by Lottie’s bedside all that night. watching, while her mother got a little needed rest. Lottie opened her eyes and saw him, and seemed so delighted.
“Sing to me my own hymn, daddy,”
“Shall we gather at His coming?”
said the dear child, who had now got the turn of the fever, and seemed greatly relieved. Twice he tried to fulfill her request, but his voice faltered. Well did he know that, as he was a sinner unsaved, he could not “Gather with the saints at His coming.”
Lottie recovered, and her first outing was to her class. That same evening, she entered the little hall, leading her father by the hand, to hear the Gospel, and God used His own Word to set the captive free. Lottie’s father received Jesus as his Saviour, and confessed Him as his Lord, and now, in his own sphere, he lives for Christ.
ML 01/11/1942