“Okay, José, within an hour you must board your ship!”
José shrugged his shoulders and contemplated the voyage indifferently. There was nothing to indicate that it would be any different from the many others he had made. A steward’s job aboard a freighter doesn’t provide much excitement, and regular trips to South African ports can become pretty monotonous.
While waiting, he was sitting in the living room of their neat little home near Lisbon. While his wife packed the clothes he would need for four or five weeks at sea, José casually picked up a book that lay beside the sewing machine.
“Christian Reading,” he mused. “A religious book, judging from the title. Well, I’m forty years old now and have knocked about the world too much to bother about religion. If all Christians were like my old mother, there might be something to it.”
It was years since he had seen his mother, though she never failed to write and he knew that she never ceased to pray for him.
“It’s good to have a mother like mine,” he continued to himself. “What a pity that our ship doesn’t cross the Atlantic sometimes—then there might be a chance of putting in at a port near where she lives.”
Listlessly he opened the book in his hands. Immediately his eyes fell on the words: “So then every one of us shall give account of himself to God” (Romans 14:1212So then every one of us shall give account of himself to God. (Romans 14:12)).
Here was a meeting José had never reckoned on! He had always been careful to keep short accounts with his mates. Now all of a sudden he realized a day was coming when he must settle up with God.
His wife glanced up and saw that something was the matter, and asked him what was wrong. He gave an evasive answer, but asked her to put a Bible in his bag.
He made his way to the ship, preoccupied with this strange new thought: he would have to meet God about his sins.
His sins! All his thoughts now revolved around his sinful past. Feelings of guilt and horror possessed him.
He could not sleep at night, but tossed for hours in his bunk. Nor did the morning bring relief, for so great was his distress that he could not eat. When he opened and searched the Book again, every sin he had ever committed seemed to be written down there in terms of judgment.
The other members of the crew advised him to throw the Bible overboard—otherwise, they said, he would go mad. But he dared not do that, though its message filled him with the terrors of hell. Days went by, and his anguish only increased. There was not a single ray of light to pierce the gloom.
But behind the clouds God was working to prepare José’s soul for blessing. In His time and in His way, He caused the unhappy man at last to discover these words: “All sins shall be forgiven unto the sons of men, and blasphemies wherewith soever they shall blaspheme” (Mark 3:2828Verily I say unto you, All sins shall be forgiven unto the sons of men, and blasphemies wherewith soever they shall blaspheme: (Mark 3:28)).
Here was a promise from the lips of the Saviour Himself, and he laid hold of it. As he did so, a wonderful calm came over his storm-tossed soul. José at once resolved that, as soon as his boat returned to Lisbon, he would seek someone who could show him the way of salvation.
His first evening on shore found him in a gospel meeting. There he heard the wonderful truth that has brought peace to millions: “The blood of Jesus Christ [God’s] Son cleanseth us from all sin” (1 John 1:77But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin. (1 John 1:7)). He believed and was saved and rejoiced.
His first act was to write to his mother and tell her that her prayers had been heard in heaven and gloriously answered.
God can save a repentant sinner at any age and in any place, regardless of their nationality or moral condition. He can use a few words in print to tear the veil from our eyes. Yes, He can use José’s brief, true story to bring others—to bring you—face to face with the realities of eternity.
“ The Lord is not . . . willing that any should
perish, but that all should come to repentance.”