On his bedside table lay his pipe and his bottle, and old Ralph looked at his visitor defiantly. "I know what you've come for," he grumbled.
"What is that?"
"You've come to say, Give up your drink, and you're all right for time and eternity."
"You are quite wrong!"
"Well, then, it's Out with your pipe, and open goes heaven's gate for you."
"You are wrong again."
"Oh, well, you folks have never got but three things to tell a man; if it ain't those two, why, it's the other."
"Well, what is that?" asked the visitor.
"Why," he replied, half lifting himself on the bed and raising his voice, "it's Will you give your heart to God?"
"Wrong—all wrong! It's Do you know that God gave His Son for you?"
A silence followed. Then the visitor told Ralph of God's exceeding grace in providing for our deep need by sending His own Son into the world to die for us; that anyone, no matter what they may have been, who believes on the Son of God should not perish, but have eternal life. Therefore it was not a question of our giving up, but of God's giving. He gave His Son to die, that the sinner who believes should receive eternal life.
Nearly an hour passed; then Ralph said, "I don't say I haven't been an awful sinner, for I have, but if there's to be a Savior for such as I, it must be such an one as you've told me about, for never another would do!"
Never again was he heard to grumble about "giving up." Next time the visitor came, he was greeted with a radiant smile and thanksgiving for the wonderful gift that God gave.