(From the French).
THE following narrative, illustrative of God’s faithfulness in answering the prayers of His children, will, we trust, be of interest to Christian parents, and encourage them not to grow weary in presenting their children before the Lord. It is also, at the same time, an appeal to you, dear unconverted reader; it is yet another call to you from God to count no longer on your health, your strength, your youth, but to turn now to that God of grace who willeth not that any should perish, but rather that all should come to repentance.
I had been summoned as a friend and physician to the bedside of a young girl, who, a few days before, was, to all appearance, in the possession of the most robust health. I was struck, the moment I saw her, by the prostrate and extremely weak state to which in so short a time she had been reduced. The gravity of the symptoms which manifested themselves aroused fears on my part that the disease must prove fatal, and. these were only too strongly confirmed by the opinion of other doctors who were successively called in The patient was a young girl who, by her many amiable qualities, had endeared herself both to her family and to her friends. Brought up by Christian parents, she had the knowledge of the truth revealed in the Word of God.
Her father had fallen asleep in Jesus, and she knew that he was with the Lord. She was aware also that her mother’s greatest desire was for the conversion of her children, and that this was her constant prayer to God. But if asked how it was with her soul, an embarrassed smile would be her only reply; and it was evident that though she listened to the Word of God with a certain degree of respect, it was from no real sense of need that she did so.
How many souls there are who remain thus cold and indifferent to that which is most precious and most important, the ineffable love of God in giving His Son, that sinners might obtain eternal salvation! Are you among this number, dear reader? The heart is by nature careless about the things of God. They are foolishness to it; and indeed it is impossible that it should be otherwise. But grace surmounts every obstacle, and breaks down every barrier. And of its power our young friend was an example.
The Sunday before her illness she had been present at a gospel meeting which her mother usually attended. Some there remembered afterward the marked attention with which she had listened to words which spoke of the frailty of life, that vapor which appears for a little moment and then vanishes away, that flesh which is as grass, and its glory as the flower of grass. Yet she was far from thinking that, like a flower soon to be gathered, she was ere long to become a striking proof of these divine truths.
From the first day of her illness, I felt greatly led to remind her of what she had recently heard. She listened to my words, and the Lord, who was evidently working in this soul, hitherto careless of salvation, gave her to feel her helplessness and misery, and the need she had of a Saviour. Still, the result of the work going on in her soul might have remained unknown to us, and the great day of eternity alone have revealed what the Lord had done for our young friend, had He not been graciously pleased to comfort the poor mother, and her friends, by giving them the precious assurance that this soul belonged to Himself.
The advance of the disease was so rapid that by the evening of the fifth day the mother had lost all hope of preserving her child and thought of nothing else but the salvation of her soul. At midnight I was called for. I found her weeping and praying, no longer for her daughter’s recovery, but for her conversion, and some testimony to comfort and rejoice her heart; and in this I joined her. Shortly after midnight, the alarming symptoms seemed to abate, and the condition of the sufferer became more satisfactory. The faint hope, however, that thus sprung up in our hearts was destined to be but of short duration; but our last prayers were granted.
The disease, in attacking the nervous system, had reduced the patient to a state of almost complete lethargy, but it had pleased God to preserve her consciousness. She was thus able to listen to the truths presented to her; the Lord’s touching appeals reached her heart, and, deeply impressed by the love of Jesus, by faith she embraced Him as her Saviour. From that moment, the expression of her countenance was a reflection of the joy of heaven, telling us of close communion with the God whose love she was tasting.
The Lord Jesus can finish very quickly the work He has begun. How long did it take to accomplish it in the heart of the poor thief hanging on a cross at His side? And I seemed to hear Him say to this dying one too, “This day shalt thou be with me in paradise.” Dear reader, if at this moment you were struck down in death, could these words be addressed to you?
Do you rejoice in the happy assurance that you will go to be with the Lord at whatever hour He comes?
The last moment on earth for the young sufferer was fast approaching, but each look, though already fading, spoke neither of anguish, nor of the fear of death, nor of careless indifference, but of peace, of joy itself. I see even now some incredulous ones smiling and refusing to believe that in presence of Death such feelings could be possible. Let such listen then to the solemn testimony that fell from the lips of one who stood on the brink of eternity, at the portals of that unknown world at which they tremble, but which for her shone with the brightness of Christ.
For some hours no word had escaped her; her limbs were motionless; her face and breathing alone betokened that life was not extinct. “Are you safe, are you happy and at rest?” we asked her. “Yes,” she replied, with an energy of which before she had seemed altogether incapable. It was God responding to our prayers. That “Yes,” so emphatic, we received from Him, and it remains forever graven on our hearts. It was the last word she uttered. Several times, still hearing a passage of scripture repeated, or the verse of a hymn sung softly, she endeavored to show that she joined in spirit, though her lips could give no sign. And soon she passed away forever from this earthly dwelling which is but a tent; absent from the body, she was present with the Lord, till the breaking of the resurrection morn.
Dear reader, whether you are young and .strong, rich, surrounded by friends, beloved by your parents, a bright future before you; or whether poor, and lonely, and without support Death is pursuing you! at each moment his footsteps draw nearer! soon his hand may be upon you! Do you ever think of it? Would you not possess this assurance, this peace, this joy, which, at her last hour on earth, filled the heart of this young sufferer?
If the question were put to you (and I put it to you now) —Are you safe, are you happy?—could you answer by a firm, true, and solemn “Yes”? If you have not peace with God, and the assurance of salvation, no longer put off the time, but come now to Jesus, to Him who has made peace by the blood of His cross, and who, by His death and rising, enables all who believe in Him to look fearlessly and with joy beyond the tomb, by faith to behold His face in glory, and hear Him saying, “I am the resurrection and the life; he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live; and whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die.” (John 5:25, 2625Verily, verily, I say unto you, The hour is coming, and now is, when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God: and they that hear shall live. 26For as the Father hath life in himself; so hath he given to the Son to have life in himself; (John 5:25‑26)).
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