WITH blackened face and begrimed clothes, “big Jack” was tramping steadily homewards after his usual heavy day’s work at the iron foundry. I cannot tell you what his thoughts were as, with hands thrust far into his pockets, and head bent down, he slouched along the road. He was not a lad of many words at any time, but the contented look on his pleasant face ever told of a heart at peace with God. Whatever his reverie may have been on the evening in question, it was suddenly interrupted by one whose appearance formed a marked contrast with “big Jack,” in the grimy working clothes.
Right in the pathway stood a smart recruiting sergeant, resplendent in spotless scarlet coat, and looking just as trim, and clean, and as well-to-do as possible. “Big Jack” instinctively drew on one side of the pavement, lest contact with his sooty coat should soil such marvelous cleanliness, thinking to pass unnoticed. But the sergeant noticing the broad, vigorous frame, and the honest look in the gray eyes that glanced at him, saw material such as he was seeking, stopped the youth, saying abruptly—
“Ain’t you about tired of this job, young man?”
Smiling pleasantly, although his words were gruff enough, “big Jack” answered—
“And if I be, I ain’t a-going to take up with your’n,” and without further parley he trudged on to the humble home, where his patient widowed mother awaited him.
Now it struck me, when Jack told me this incident, that we Christians might learn much from the ready zeal of the recruiting sergeant. Not one moment did he let slip in accosting an entire stranger to give him an invitation to serve his Queen. As we pass through this world, “by sin undone,” many a gloomy face we meet that bears the unmistakable stamp of a sin-stained life; could we not ask such if they are not weary of the service of a hard master, whose only wages are death? Might not the homely words of the sergeant, “Ain’t you about tired of this job?” apply to them with a sorrowful intensity that they did not to the one to whom they were addressed? Surely if we did but show the same diligence and energy in pressing the claims of our Master, we might win more souls to enlist themselves in His service. I fear that among our everyday associates there may be some who have never heard a like interrogation from our lips, nor received any invitation from us to enroll themselves under the banner of our Leader. Let us, dear fellow-Christian, seek to show our colors as unmistakably as did this soldier. What a long way off that brilliant scarlet coat could be seen, giving undoubted proof that the wearer was a servant of Her Gracious Majesty the Queen! Should it be less evident that we are Christ’s servants, stamped as His blood-bought ones? Let us each one seek to prove ourselves good soldiers of Jesus Christ, glorying in the privilege of being His ambassadors, not easily rebuffed, if we meet with a discouraging reception, but putting forth every effort to recruit the bright ranks of the army of the Great Captain of our salvation, from the sorrowful band of heartsick, weary captives of the enemy.
D. & A. C.