IT has been my happy privilege to have a Christian father, and many a time in my youth did he speak to me about my soul! At the age of twelve I made a sort of profession of religion after attending revival services, but it did not last long; and by-and-bye I began to get reckless, and went on from bad to worse.
After a time I joined the Royal Navy, and the very day I went away from home and friends, the Lord showed me that my soul was not saved. I tried to be good, and betook myself to praying and other religious exercises. At night, in my hammock, I used to pray; and oh, how I used to weep! And then I would hope and wait to feel a change, but all in vain. I joined the “Good Templars,” and, believe me, I thirsted more than ever, and was always thinking what I could do to obtain peace of mind. Then the feeling would come that there was nothing to rest upon, and that my house was built on the sand. My friends believed me to be a very religious lad, but if they spoke to me, I was plain with them, and often told them that my soul was not saved. I was in this state for four years and eight months, when at last it pleased the Lord to show me, that salvation was not to be obtained through doings, or feelings, but simply by what the Lord Jesus had done long before, by His finished work on the cross. I think it was the work of an instant, when I realized that the blessed Saviour had suffered on the cross for me. Oh! what joy filled my poor soul, when I learned that the unsearchable riches of Christ were mine!
If you have not already experienced soul-thirst, may you be led by the grace of God to yearn for that living water, which “Whosoever will may take freely.”
J. R.