Becomes a Preacher of Christ, the Son of God. Chapter 11.
AT this period of my life, I attended the services held in a Baptist chapel, at which I found great blessing to my soul. One evening it fell on me to engage in prayer. It was the first time I had opened my mouth in public, and I felt as ashamed of myself as if I had committed a crime, and during the rest of the prayer-meeting was very much cast down. However, the minister, in whose chapel I was, in his closing prayer, besought the Most High to prepare me to go forth and preach the gospel of His Son. This prayer surprised me greatly, and I did not think it would be answered.
When the meeting was over, the minister, in conversation with me, told me it was his conviction that I was to go forward and preach the gospel; but I was ignorant of the English language, and could not feel that his conviction had any weight with me. Months passed by, and I continued to attend the same chapel, and began by degrees to feel the importance of doing something to glorify the Name of my Saviour. I commenced teaching in the Sunday-school, and afterward, with a friend, began visiting the poor and infirm inmates of Bethnal Green Workhouse, and when thus engaged, joy became unspeakable, for I found my labor was not in vain, for a poor old woman on her dying bed declared from her heart that my poor words had been blessed to her soul!
Seeing the Lord was pleased to use me, I felt it a joy and a duty to testify for Him wherever I could do so. There was a Jewish family in Whitechapel with whom I had a conversation respecting the promised Messiah. An intelligent young man, then present, anxiously listened, and I told him how the Lord had dealt with me since I left my native land, and how I had been brought to the knowledge of the truth as it is in Jesus. We spent some hours arguing from the law. He expressed a wish to go out for a walk with me, and we discussed the coming of the Messiah for a long time, and then went into a coffee-house, where I obtained a prate room. I proposed to my young friend that he should kneel down and pray, but as kneeling in prayer is against the Jewish custom, he refused. However, I knelt down and prayed in the German-language.
I then introduced this young man to Mr. Stern, under whose instructions he remained for some months, and afterward, to my great joy, he made a public confession of the Lord Jesus Christ. The Lord had blessed me to one of my brethren after the flesh, to a Jew. Upon this I felt that I must go amongst the Jews, preaching to them Christ crucified and exalted, whether they would hear or whether they would forbear.
I visited several synagogues, and entered quietly into conversation with the Jews on the Messiahship of Jesus Christ, but, upon their finding out that I was a Hebrew Christian, they turned me out. This did not discourage me, for I felt that but a few months previously I should have done the selfsame thing.
I was also able to visit the London and the German Hospitals, and in the latter I found special encouragement. There I lighted or a poor Jew, a German, who was lying in bed, and who had no one to say a kind word to him; he was pleased enough, in his loneliness, for me to speak to him. Whenever the hospital was opened to visitors, I saw him, and took him little presents, and after a while he would listen to me about Jesus, the Messiah. Some two months passed by, and then he expressed his firm belief in the Lord Jesus Christ, and his conduct testified that he had received the grace of God in his heart.
At last the icy hand of death touched him; but before he died he declared his faith and joy in Jesus, the Saviour, who had so marvelously revealed Himself to his soul. The poor man’s gratitude to me also, for being the instrument of his conversion, was such that my heart raised another Ebenezer, and overflowed, for the Lord had given me the honor of bringing into the flock of Christ another of the outcasts of Israel. The joy that filled me on seeing that the Lord would use so feeble an instrument to accomplish His great purposes in the conversion of my brethren, made me determine to use all my energy to proclaim Jesus and His love.
The question now arose, “What shall I do next”? and I often used the prayer of the Apostle Paul, “Lord, what wilt Thou have me to do”? Should I go to the heathen, and tell them of Christ, or should I go to the Jews in distant lands? I felt very much attached to England, and more and more disinclined to leave the shores where I had realized the sweet liberty Britons enjoy, and especially the freedom to serve God as conscience dictated. After a great deal of questioning with myself, I decided I would go to New Zealand. A free passage was offered me, and I prepared for the voyage, in company with two young men who had been inmates of the Operative Jewish Converts’ Institution.
However, when calling upon Mr. Stern to tell him my purpose, he so strongly advised my remaining in England that I could but follow his counsel. As he had been to different Darts of the East, and had preached the gospel to different tribes and nations, I felt his advice was not that of an ordinary peon. So I continued my visits to the London and the German Hospitals, and to the Bethnal Green and the Luke’s Workhouses, and labored as far as I could in the slums and the public houses of the East end of London, remembering that to England my steps were directed by a loving God, and that in England I had been led to a knowledge of Jesus Christ, my Lord and Saviour. These early efforts were much blessed, both to the conversion and the refreshment of souls, and also to my own spirit.
About this time I was requested to preach in a Baptist chapel at Hackney. It was a great ordeal, and I trembled as I stood before a large assembly, for I was young, and perhaps younger in the truth, than any of the congregation.
This was my text, “I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ” (Rom. 1:1616For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek. (Romans 1:16)), and during my address the Lord stood by me. Approval was shown by the hearers, and my sermon being over, I was charged, in the name of my Master, to go forth to preach the gospel of God’s sovereign grace. Since that eventful night I have preached continually, and, although I have often feared the brook would dry up, God has ever supplied me with words. I was engaged in secular employment during the day, and, after business hours, traveled to different villages preaching, or occupied myself in studying the Scriptures. I rejoice to record the faithfulness of God, and the truth of His promise, “As thy days, so shall thy strength be.”
The reader will understand that my knowledge of the truths of the New Testament was of a limited character. My experience of Christianity was that of a new-born babe. However, the Holy Spirit is a patient teacher, and little by little He led me on into the deeper truths of Scripture. I was satisfied I knew Jesus Christ as my Lord, my Shepherd, and my Friend, and, although at times I have had to pass through dark clouds, and have been tried by unbelief and fear, I have, by God’s grace, not failed to rejoice in Christ Jesus, and in His all-cleansing blood.