I LIVED a careless life, without any thought for my soul, until after my marriage, when, through God’s grace, my wife being awakened to concern for her salvation, she began also to care for mine. It was one Sunday evening, some fifteen years ago, when she first begged me to go with her to chapel. Though I refused in a hardened spirit, no sooner had she gone and left me to my thoughts, then I became oppressed with the sense of my sinful and ungodly state. How I wished I had gone with her! I was so wretched that I thought the time would never pass before she returned. I could not keep my misery to myself, and, on my wife’s return, told her how I felt, and asked her to pray for me. This she said she could not do, as she did not know how to pray for herself.
“Well, then,” said I, “let us both kneel down together,” and in my poor, ignorant way I poured out my first prayer to God, if those poor, dark words could be called prayer. My past life came vividly before my eyes, and the memory of my sins seemed to tell me that, if I continued as I was, I must reap the wages of sin, which is death. I made a vow, God helping me, from that time to forsake my evil ways, and to endeavor to lead a Christian life. “Lord, help me!” I cried, and continued thus praying for help for three months. I thought every day I was becoming better, but at last I found that praying would not save me.
I was at that time master of a smack, called “The Elizabeth,” belonging to my parents. They offered to spend a hundred pounds on the vessel to get her ready for pleasuring in the summer if I would take her. I knew that pleasuring would compel me to work on Sundays, and this my conscience condemned; but, unhappy about it as I was, I had not the courage to refuse my parents’ offer, so I accepted it, and daily asked God to deliver me out of this vessel and give me another berth. I did not see that I was disobeying His word by accepting the offer, and had no right to expect Him to deliver me by a plan of my own devising. Day by day I was engaged unrigging the smack to prepare her for the pleasuring, which occupation took about a fortnight. Regularly as morning came round, as I passed the Droit Office at six o’clock, this thought came into my mind, “Here I go to my work again, and the Lord has not delivered me,” and then I feared I was not praying aright, so God would not help me to live a Christian life. This added to my unhappiness. At last the 24th of May came round, when it is the custom to fire a royal salute. I was inadvertently too near, and some of the powder from the first gun that was fired struck my shoulder, and laid me senseless.
When I came to myself my first thought was, “If that charge had killed me, should I have escaped hell?” I could not answer my own question, as I lay helpless on a bed in the hospital, thrown out of work. God, however, had not only delivered me from Sunday work, but He was bringing me to see that all my righteousnesses were as filthy rags in His sight, and on that sick bed He brought me to the end of all my self-righteous attempts to save myself.
Several Christian people visited me, and they all said one and the same thing. It was only by believing on the Lord Jesus Christ that I could be saved. This troubled me, for I could not understand what they meant, that I had only to believe. One day, as I was lying upon my bed, I stretched out my hand and took up the Testament, and something seemed to say, “If you want to be saved, believe that Book,” and while lying there the Lord revealed Himself to me, and I was enabled to take Christ as my own personal Saviour, and I am happy to say from that time, He has enabled me to seek to follow in His footsteps.
I could not tell anyone how good He has been to me, and how He has heard and answered my poor prayers. He has always given me double what I have asked Him for, and of this I will give you one instance.
Once I was very badly off, and had not a shilling of my own, As I knew it would trouble my wife, I did not want her to know it, so I went down to the rocks and asked the Lord to give me a shilling. You may say it was a strange place to go to ask for a shilling, but I wanted it sorely, and I knew my Heavenly Father was acquainted with all my trouble. I had no sooner asked for the shilling than my eye was directed to a piece of drifted lead lying among the rocks. I picked it up, and, taking it to the town, sold it for two shillings; my prayer was answered twice over. I have never been so poor since then, and I can say I have reason indeed to speak well of Him and to bless His name. Let me just ask you, who read this story of mine, to put your trust in the Lord Jesus Christ, and you will be as happy as the young fisherman. R. W.