Too Proud to be Seen There
Foolish parents teach their, sons and daughters to look down upon those whom they regard as being beneath them in social scale, and often lead them to ruin for time and eternity. Such a case came under my notice not long ago, in the case of a young, gay girl, the daughter of the parents who considered themselves of the “upper classes,” and more anxious to preserve the “caste” of their sons and daughters, than to ensure their morals, or secure their salvation.
The daughters of a neighboring family, who were in quite as good a position socially as the other, invited this fair but thoughtless girl to a Gospel Service, conducted by a well-known preacher in their vicinity. The only desire of these Christian girls was, that the fragile girl might hear of something to give her the joy and satisfaction she sought for in vain in the gay scenes which she was in the habit of frequenting, but to their invitation she gave the stinging reply that “only very common people went there.”
Pride of rank, as in the days of old, forbade her to mingle with the “common people” who, as in the days of Christ’s earthly ministry, “heard Him gladly.”
Poor, proud thing! little did she think that within two brief weeks of that night, her fragile form would be laid beneath the sod, right among the “common people” in the village graveyard, and her soul in the world beyond.
Do not let pride of rank, pride of family, pride of personal beauty, or any other form of pride, lead you to a lost eternity, to lament your folly in rejecting God’s full and free salvation forever. True, you will not be saved as “one of the better class,” not even as a moral or a religious sinner, bot—if you are willing to take your place as one of the common people” —a sinner for whom Christ died, then, as such, there is salvation for you, for it was to save sinners that Christ Jesus came into the world.
ML 05/05/1940