I HAVE heard many striking testimonies to the power of the Lord Jesus to change the disposition of the sinners He saves. The following has left a deep and lasting impression on my mind, and I write it that the reader may glorify Him who alone has power,
“To change the leper’s spots
And melt the heart of stone.”
“One of the master’s horses,” said a man to me, “was a very bad-tempered animal, and none of the men could do anything with her but myself, and I am sorry to say I used her very cruelly.
“The morning after I was converted, as I entered the stable I saw everything with new eyes. The horses, indeed all that I saw, looked beautiful. The first thing I did was to go up to this bad-tempered horse, and throw my arms round her neck. I fondled and stroked her as though she had been a child. I shall never forget the way she looked at me; how she turned her head, and the surprise I could see in her eyes, I think nothing made me feel how bad I had been like this look of surprise. She seemed to understand all I meant, and all the time I had charge of the horses I never had any more trouble with her. I treated her gently, and spoke kindly to her, and I can tell you, she knew as well as my wife and children knew, that I was converted. They Is suffered from my anger, as the horse had done, and were held in fear by me; but now I am serving a new master everybody knows it, and I am sure the horses do.”
Oh, how very, very fast some are “bound in misery and iron,” in the bondage and slavery of sin! The enemy of souls just makes us do his bidding until Jesus sets us free. Then we can say and sing with David, “Our soul is escaped as a bird out of the snare of the fowlers: the snare is broken, and we are escaped.” (Psalm 124:77Our soul is escaped as a bird out of the snare of the fowlers: the snare is broken, and we are escaped. (Psalm 124:7).)
Years ago, when I was in the enemy’s hand, I used to feel like one in an iron cage. Every year the fetters were drawn round me more closely, every sin forged the chains more firmly, but Jesus has snapped them all, and now I am free! Oh! I do thank Him that my soul is escaped, and I praise Him also for every soul that is freed. I long to know if yours has “escaped” also; and, if so, I know that not only does the Lord Jesus know it, and your loving Father knows it, but your wile, children, friends, know it also. “The snare is broken, and we are escaped.”
ML-10/02/1960