Some years ago, the writer was obliged to attend one of the courts in the city of London, on behalf of his firm. While waiting for the case in which he was interested to come on, several others were taken first, among them, that of a cutter to a well-known firm of city tailors.
The charge against him was read. It was to the effect that the accused man had stolen a roll of cloth valued between three and four pounds.
“Have you anything to say?” asked the judge in a stern voice.
There was an inaudible murmur as the man stood in the dock, with his head bowed. “I see,” said the judge, “you have been with your employers for fifteen years. Have they always paid you fair wages?”
“Yes,” murmured the man.
“Don’t you consider that to steal their property is a mean, despicable way of treating them, after the manner in which they have served you? You will be fined twenty-five dollars or ten days in default,” said the judge.
“I haven’t a penny in the world,” cried the man.
“Then you will go to prison,” replied the judge.
At that moment there was a cry from the back of the court and all eyes turned quickly, to see a woman with her head buried in her hands, sobbing pitifully. She was obviously the man’s wife, waiting to hear the verdict.
Almost simultaneously there rose from the front of the court a tall, well-dressed man of about sixty-five years of age, and he addressed the judge thus:
“Your Worship, I wish with your permission to say a few words as to this case. I am this man’s employer, and I have a favor to ask: Once before in my life I appeared in this very court on a similar quest and I have never had cause to regret it. I myself am desirous of paying the fine which the Bench has just imposed I ask you to let me do so now — and then to reinstate the man in his former position.”
“Your request is granted,” said the judge.
Never shall I forget the tenseness of that moment. The accused man burst into tears, while almost every head was bowed in emotion, as, stepping toward the dock that tall figure took the arm of his employee and gently led him away.
The demands of justice were fully met, yet love and compassion were supreme.
You say: “That man would be won for life!” I reply: “He certainly ought to have been.”
The fine, indeed, had to be paid in full and it was, and as a result, the guilty was freed.
Can you imagine the feelings of that man toward his employer? I think I can.
Now what I want to ask you is this. Have you ever thought of what the Lord Jesus has done for you? Our position is just like that of the man in our story. We have sinned against God, not once, but many times, and unless the just penalty which those sins deserve is fully met by someone who, like this man, is prepared to pay the penalty which is mine, one day I shall have to appear before God, at a far higher court — at “the great white throne.”
If we stand there with our sins unforgiven, stern justice will of necessity find me both guilty and condemned, and then there will be no Saviour, for the day of mercy will have passed forever.
The wonderful story of God’s grace is: that Jesus, on Calvary’s cross, suffered “the Just for the unjust” and has borne the full judgment of our sins, so that the penalty having been paid in full, God not only delights freely to forgive, but to fill our hearts with the love that has brought about, entirely from His own side, so wonderful a deliverance. Selected.
ML 10/29/1961