What a bit of bad luck had happened to him! So thought Jimmy Norton when his wife "turned religious." She said she had found the Lord Jesus Christ to be her Savior and her Friend, but Jim did not understand it at all.
Everything was changed. He had had a large extra room built into his new house for dancing, card parties, and the like, and she would no longer join in that sort of thing. What could a man, such as he was, do with a, wife like that? He was a gambler, and the race track drew him as the magnet draws the needle. His wife had not minded going with him and having a "flutter" on her own account in former days, but she had given up that too. This enraged him so much that he wondered if he should turn her out of the house.
His house was quite close to the race track, and the racing season was on. He hurried home from town one day at noon, hastily swallowed the lunch his wife had prepared for him, and dashed off to the races as usual. His wife went to her room, and kneeling before God prayed for her husband. She asked that he might lose his money, for she thought that was the only way in which he could be cured of gambling.
When Jim got to the track he found his friends crowding around the bookmakers to bet their money on the horses. They seemed to be backing every horse in the field. Instead of joining them as usual, he stood back and watched them, and almost involuntarily said to himself, "What a pack of fools!" After a moment's thought he added, "and I'm one of them." God was answering his wife's prayer and doing even more than she had asked, for he soon had lost all interest in the horses, and wandered off the course without making a bet, a thoroughly wretched man.
He became a mystery to himself. Why couldn't he sleep at night? He blamed his wife, and, swearing at her, he would get up and drink and smoke and rampage about the house. Then he would return to bed, ashamed of himself and yet more angry because of that which had come into his home to mar his pleasure.
The Christian wife had some new friends who loved the Savior and believed in prayer. She invited them to her house one afternoon for prayer to God that He would quickly 'break down her husband's rebellious will and save his soul. The prayer hour was to be from 3 to 4 o'clock.
Jim, completely ignorant of what was going on at home, was posting his cash book at his office in the city. When he had finished— it was 3:55— he pushed the book away from him, exclaiming: "My G—, I've reached the limit. I'm through. Something's got to be done!" Suddenly in that quiet office a voice that seemed to him to be perfectly audible said in his ear and heart: "Are you stronger than God?”
Ah, that was the point. He knew he was fighting against God, wrestling hard against God's desire to bless him. He was flinging God's mercy in His face, thinking that he was stronger than God. That was the cause of all his misery. Filled with awe because of the voice he had heard, he buried his head in his hands and said, "God forbid that I should pretend to be stronger than You.”
That evening at home Jim was very quiet. Presently he asked his wife, "Does God speak to men today as He used to do?”
"Sometimes," she replied.
"Then," he said, "He spoke to me at four o'clock today," and he broke down in tears. Jim had reached his limit in a different way from what he had thought. He was through in the fight he had been waging; and something did happen, the greatest and best thing of all. His wife, converted only a few weeks herself, told him again of her Savior, of His grace and love. She told him how upon the cross of Calvary He had died for sinners such as he was, and that His precious blood could wash him clean of every stain of sin in God's sight.
It was a simple sermon that she presented to him, and from her very heart; but it was effectual. He saw the way of blessing, bowed before God, and confessed himself to be a sinner indeed. He soon put his whole confidence in the Lord Jesus Christ for salvation.
Not long afterward, in the very room in his house that had been built for dancing, Jim told the story to nearly fifty people. With a face radiant with joy, he told them of Christ as a living Savior whose blood had cleansed him and whose love had satisfied him. A happy man is that former gambler, and a happy family is his, for his whole house has believed the gospel, as did the house of the jailer at Philippi.
Friend, are you seeking for satisfaction in the excitement of a life of pleasure? The end of these things is death. For true contentment, turn to Christ. "He satisfies the longing soul, and fills the hungry soul with goodness.”