ON the 29th day of May, 1881 as I stood in a lane, leaning over a gate, God by His Holy Spirit pierced my hitherto rebellious heart by impressing this awful fact upon me: "If I die as I am I shall die without Christ." But an hour before I had gazed upon the face of my dearest friend, who had been killed instantly in an accident, lying in his coffin, cold and stiff in death. As I looked on him a voice seemed to say: "This is your future; some day others will gaze upon your face. What about your soul and your eternal destiny?" I felt unable to answer or evade the searching question. I then sought a lonely lane to meditate; as I did so this solemn fact pressed upon me, If I die as I am I shall die without Christ. I would not have died without a good character, for I never knew the taste of strong drink of any kind, shunned all unbecoming language, and attended Sunday school regularly till about 20 years of age; but I had never been "born again.”
I had often argued with Christians against being saved, and proved more than a match for some of them. But this argument was more than a match for me: If I die as I am I shall die without Christ. I had often listened to infidels, but all they said seemed to be the outcome of bitter opposition and hatred against Christianity, and never the fruit of unbiased judgment. I had often wished the Bible could be proved untrue—that there was no God, and no hereafter, and that death was a goal instead of the gateway to eternity. But all was too real for me now. I stood stricken and trembling under this crushing stroke: If I die as I am I shall die without Christ.
The powers of pen and tongue fail me to express the experience of that hour. I cried: What can I do, how can I be saved, and know my sins forgiven? And as I stood there distressed, beneath God's pitying eye, God's Holy Spirit, who had convinced me of my Christless condition, brought this verse which I had learned at Sunday school to my memory: "For God so loved the world that He gave His only-begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life" (John 3:1616For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. (John 3:16)).
I reasoned thus: If God loves the world, He loves me. He gave His only-begotten Son. I thought of His cross, of His suffering for sin, the thorny crown, the pierced hands, the riven side; all this had a meaning to me now, and a message for my soul. "Whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life." I said: "Lord, I believe, I believe, yes, I believe." At last I simply rested on the atoning death of our Lord Jesus Christ, and believed God's Holy Word, that "whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life." I hurried to the house to tell my relatives I was saved, and, getting a Bible, I was soon reading John 3:1616For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. (John 3:16), and, having read and re-read it, I knelt down in my room and thanked God for loving me, and for giving the Lord Jesus Christ to die for me, and for assuring me by His Word that "whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”
The 22 years that have intervened have only served to endear me to my Savior and His Word. J. W’K.