I WAS terribly hard up, having had to sell I nearly everything to pay expenses before I came home. I was very anxious to set up my Gospel room with twelve forms, and also, as the cold weather had set in, I badly wanted a waistcoat. I did not know what to do, whether to buy the forms or the waistcoat; but the tailor’s price decided me in favor of the forms; he asked fifteen shillings for the warm garment I required, so I gave up all hope of buying it for a month or two, and, in the meantime, made this need a matter of prayer. I just told the Lord how that in Egypt, by turning my house into a soldiers’ and sailors’ meeting house, I had completely emptied the family stock; and that now, being in delicate health, I was feeling the cold of England very much. I prayed He would guide one of His children to send me the waistcoat needed, and that very week I received a letter from Colonel D.’s lady, saying, “Knowing, dear S—-H., that you are not strong, and feeling I should like to do something for the Lord, I was impressed to knit you a warm woolen waistcoat, and send it herewith, hoping it will fit.” Well, I was dumb-foundered! I had not written to Colonel D. for months, and here, through his wife, God had sent me a splendid, warm waistcoat, worth a dozen tailor’s make.
When preaching a little while ago, I told the people about this answer to prayer. Now, the place being full inside, some of the audience had to sit outside in the verandah, and amongst these was a Christian named J. W., who never loses a chance of speaking a word for the Master, and is a bright light wherever he goes. This J. W. has a wife, and, I think, eight children, and having spent almost beyond his means in the Lord’s work, he was just then hard up for a suit of clothes. Hearing my story about the waistcoat, he went home, saying to himself, “Well, here is my suit of clothes shabby and threadbare; why not tell the Father, and ask Him for a new suit?” No sooner said than done, and when J. W. does pray he always seems to lay hold of the very throne.
The next day, as he was walking down the street to his work, a gentleman at the other side of the road beckoned him to come across to him, and then said, “John, I think your clothes are beginning to look shabby; go to the tailor, and get measured for a new suit, and put it down to my account?”
J. W. was simply overwhelmed at this proof of God’s care over him. Encouraged afresh to make known his requests to God, he remembered that his poor fund was very low, so that when visiting the needy he had little to give them. He therefore laid that matter before God, and lo! that same day he received by post a ₤5 note with the words, “For your poor work.”
May God increase our faith in His power and in His love.