AT the present time we are passing through the winter, but how soon it will be followed by spring once more! Two or three shorts months and winter will have passed. Thus are we reminded of the rapid flight of time, and you, my reader, are passing on also, but to what place are you passing?
If I could take a peep into your home for a short time; listen to your conversation, notice what books you prefer to read, and see what kind of companions you choose, I could very soon tell to what country you are bound; whether you are treading the narrow pathway to the golden city, or whether your back is turned to that way, and you are treading the downward path.
Now we are just about to commence a new year, and many little folks I know make up their minds what they think they will do in the new year. Each year seems to bring with it big promises of good things to be said or done, but often, alas! they fade away as quickly as the morning dew.
Bad habits are sometimes sought to be discontinued, and new leaves are to be turned in right good earnest, and why is it so, may I ask? Ah! it is that more happiness may be the portion of those who act thus. Well, we all like to be happy, and I dare say my reader is no exception to this rule; and if so, let me tell you how the coming year may be a most happy one to you, yea, happier far than all those that have gone before.
How pleasant it is to have a friend by our side that we love very much, especially If we have the knowledge that the friend also loves us very much. How short the time seems as the hours slip by, and evening is reached long before we thought it would come. Now why has it been so? simply because we have been happy, very happy, in each other’s company.
Would not you, my reader, like to be as happy at that, not for a short time only, but day after day. for the rest of your life?
Listen then, while I tell you the secret of it. There is a Friend who loves you clearly, who wants to be near you always, to help you in every difficulty, and fill your heart with joy and peace. This friend only makes one condition, and that is in the reach and power of every little one to conform to. It is that you should confide yourself to Him, love Him because He first loved you. His name is, as you know—Jesus. He has done more for you than anyone else in the world, and now, dear reader, if you have never given Him your heart, do it NOW.
If you do, this joy and peace will be yours; but if you delay, neglect, or refuse, you may lose this Friend forever; but now He invites, now He calls, and O, that every reader who has never trusted in Jesus, would look to Him now!
ML 12/10/1922