Mrs. Cook, a Christian worker in Newcastle—on—Tyne, with a friend had just finished distributing notices of an evening gospel meeting to be held in a hall nearby. As they started home for supper, tired in but not of the work, Mrs. Cook suddenly said to her friend, "I must go and call at number—."
"Oh, very well," said her friend, "but not till after supper."
"The Lord tells me to go at once, and I will; supper can wait."
So they parted. Mrs. Cook walked towards the number indicated. When she got to it, there stood an anxious looking woman on the doorstep, gazing about. Mrs. Cook stopped and looked at her.
"Oh, ma'am,' the excited woman said, "do you know where I could get a minister?"
"Not just now," said Mrs. Cook; "but if it's anyone seeking the Lord Jesus, I'll be glad to talk to them."
"It's a dying girl," said the woman. "Will you come in and see her, ma'am?"
Mrs. Cook followed her upstairs and into a bedroom. There lay one of the most beautiful girls she had ever seen, and evidently she was dying. The Christian worker's heart went out to the poor girl in an instant. She sat down by the bedside and spoke to her of Jesus and His offer of salvation. The girl would not listen, and seemed angry that anyone should enter her room and speak to her like that.
Mrs. Cook left the house with an aching heart. That night she could not sleep for thinking of that poor unsaved, dying girl. Early next morning she got up, and filling a basket with some delicacies likely to tempt the appetite of an invalid, she set off in a downpour of rain for the sick room. She was soon at the house and was shown upstairs. On the landing she said, "I'll just take off my raincoat. It is dripping, and it might be bad for her if I sat in it by her bedside."
The sick girl heard this kind comment, and it touched her heart. She raised herself on her elbow as Mrs. Cook entered, and cried out, "Oh lady, why do you come to see a person like me on such a morning?"
"Why, that's nothing at all, my dear," said Mrs. Cook. "I'd do very much more than that for you."
"Ah! but lady, if you knew how wicked I am, you wouldn't come near me," said the girl.
"Wouldn't I?" said Mrs. Cook. "Didn't our Lord Jesus Christ come all the way from heaven to seek and save that which was lost? And if He came that distance, why shouldn't I come this little way?"
"Does it say lost, ma'am? Does it say lost, in the Book? Did Jesus Christ come to save the lost?" she cried out as if she had heard something delightfully sweet for the first time.
"Yes, my child, I'll read it to you out of the Book," and Mrs. Cook read from Luke 19:1010For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost. (Luke 19:10): "The Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was LOST."
Then the dying girl for the first time in her life grasped what the Lord Jesus Christ had done and that it was for her. Raising herself in the bed and stretching her arms upwards, she cried, "Oh God, how I thank Thee! You know I'm lost."
In a little, she became composed. She rested her sin-stained soul on Christ and His finished work. Jesus had sought and saved this lost one at the eleventh hour.
"Lady," she said, "please do one thing more for me. Will you write my mother, and ask her if she'll take me home to die?"
Mrs. Cook was glad to do this small service for the repentant wanderer, and in a few days her loving mother came and took her child home. She did pass away very soon; and, continued Mrs. Cook, with a happy ring in her voice as she told the story, "I'll meet that dear girl in heaven."
"Poor thing," your heart may say; "she was lost indeed." Keep your pity for yourself, my reader, for if you are Christless, you are as much lost as she was.
"All we like sheep have gone astray, we have turned every one to his own way." Note the words, "All we... have gone astray." She strayed, and so have you.
"We have turned every one to his own way." She turned to her own way, as you have turned to yours.
She was lost, and so are you. There is no difference. Has Jesus found you, as He found her? Can you say:
"I was lost but Jesus found me,
Found the sheep that went astray,
Threw His loving arms around me,
Drew me back into His way."