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 as he walked along the road with hands thrust far into his pockets and head bent down, what his thoughts were. He was not a boy 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 a new uniform, and looking just as trim and clean as possible. “Big Jack” instinctively drew to 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 honest look in the gray eyes that glanced at him, saw material such as he was seeking, stopped the youth, saying abruptly,
“Are you not tired of your job, young man?”
Smiling pleasantly, “big Jack” answered, “If I am, I have no thought of changing it for yours,” and without further words 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 country.
As we pass through this world “by sin undone,” many a gloomy face we meet which bears the unmistakable stamp of a sin-stained life; and 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 words of the sergeant, “Are you not tired of your job?” apply to them with a sorrowful intensity?
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 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 Christians, seek to show our colors as unmistakably as did this soldier. What a long way off that uniform could be seen, giving undoubted proof that the wearer was serving his country. 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.