EARLY in May 1881, I had decided to go to Africa. The members of our family accompanied me to the little railway station, about an hour’s drive from the town where we resided in Eastern Prussia, to bid me farewell. We reached there about a quarter of an hour before the train was due, and this time was spent in earnest conversation, my dear parents and sisters giving me their last advice, and expressing their best wishes for the unknown future.
Full of bright expectations, my last words to my dear parents were, “Well, I am going to make a large sum of money, enough to make me independent, and when I have reached that I shall return again and come and live near you.”
The train was then just ready to start, and the only answer to my boastful speech was from the lips of my dear mother, “God bless you, my son!”
I had just served my year in the army at Dantzic, passed the reserve officer’s examination, and got a three years’ leave for Africa. My intention was first to go to Algiers for a few years, then to Egypt, and from there to India. From childhood’s days I had always expressed a desire to go across the sea, as soon as I had fulfilled my military obligations, in search of the riches of this world. One of my comrades, of the same regiment, had resolved to go with me, as we had become intimate friends during the year of our service. We met at Berlin, but only stayed a few days at the capital, and then traveled through Germany, Switzerland, and Italy to Genoa. There we took steamer to Marseilles, and from theme to Algiers. We found, however, that, in the mercantile line, there was no possible opening for Germans at that port. The German Consul advised us to go either to America or South Africa. We decided for the latter, and returned to Marseilles. From thence we went to Bordeaux, where several of our acquaintances were living. They advised us to stay there and get into situations, but as we did not succeed we left a month later for Madeira, via Madrid and Lisbon, and from thence took the mail steamer to Port Elizabeth in South Africa.
My funds were almost exhausted, and with a bad conscience about the past and uncertainty as to the future, I became very much depressed. Many a time I stood at the railing of the steamer’s deck, when all the passengers had gone to rest, considering if it were not best to jump overboard and have done with my wretched life. One night I made up my mind to do this, but failing courage at the last moment, I ran down to my cabin, and resolved never to attempt such a thing again. Thanks be to God for keeping me from taking that fatal leap!
Arriving in Port Elizabeth at the end of July, well-nigh penniless, my companion and I soon got situations as clerks in a small up-country store.
After being there about eighteen months, my master moved to another district and took me with him, leaving my comrade in charge of the old place. On my occasional business trips to the latter, I had to pass the farm of an English storekeeper, Gert’s Kraal, on the Karoo. As this was what is called in South Africa a public “outspan,” I usually off saddled there.
One morning the old gentleman asked me to have breakfast with them. After breakfast he had Bibles brought, remarking that it was their custom to read a portion of the Word of God at that time of the day, as well as in the evening; that if I liked I could stay for the reading, but if not I could please myself. I did not care one bit for either Bible or church.
Since I left my parents’ roof at the age of eighteen, I had only attended church when on a visit homo, and this only to please my mother. But I consented on this occasion to stay for the Bible-reading. The chapter read was Isaiah 64, the 6th verse of which raised in me a feeling of wild rebellion, and I resolved, there and then, never to enter the old gentleman’s house again if I could help it.
My “righteousnesses filthy rags!” How I wished I had never entered his house at all. How dare he read such things to me!
Outwardly I kept calm, but I went away in a rage, and for the next eighteen months I took another road when passing that way, whenever possible, so as to avoid hearing things which were such an offense to me. All the time, however, I could not get rid of, “All our righteousnesses are as filthy rags.” The moment I was alone, and subsequently even when very busy, it sounded louder and louder in my heart until I was entirely upset. The more I tried to forget it, the louder it sounded, and by-and-by the question arose in my mind, “If your righteousnesses are as filthy as rags, what must your unrighteousness’s be?”
Up to that time the enemy of souls had held me captive, and led me to measure myself with my fellow-men whenever conscience aroused me, often telling me how much better I was than many of them, although I had a wicked and sinful life behind me and was thoroughly conscious of it. But when I commenced to cry out in my anguish of soul and longings to be delivered from this misery, he laughed me to scorn and told me there was no possibility of my being saved. “Look at your wicked life!” he would say; and I had to admit the truth of the accusation.
About that time my comrade and I had taken over the old business of our master. I told my partner all I underwent, but did not get any help from him, as he, too, was unconverted then. At last, my soul agony becoming unbearable, I made up my mind to go again to that old Englishman’s place and ten him that he was the cause of this my trouble. On arriving I found him down at the mill some distance from time house, and as we were alone I told him how upset I was, and that he was the cause of my wretchedness. He smiled and answered, “I am very glad to know it.”
“You are glad to see me wretched? Well, then, you must have a heart of stone.”
To this he responded, “Oh, no, young man, no.”
“Well,” I said, “what have I to do to get out of this misery?”
“Nothing, nothing,” he answered.
I was completely overwhelmed with grief, and sat down on the ground, exclaiming, “What will become of me?”
“That will be all right,” he said.
On repeating the question, “What have I to do?”
I got the same answer, “Nothing.”
“But listen! It is done,” he said. “You believe that! All is done for your salvation. Christ has done it, and you have to believe it, that is all!”
Then he advised me to read the Gospel of John carefully.
Coming up to the house, I saddled my horse and was just ready to start, when Dr. G―, who was visiting Gert’s Kraal at the time, came out. He spoke very earnestly and kindly to me, but all seemed to be ineffective. He pressed upon me the importance of doing nothing, but just trusting in the perfect work of Christ.
Putting into my hand a copy of Safety, Certainty, and Enjoyment, and advising me to read it carefully, we parted. I was as unhappy when I left as when I went, but I knew they were praying for me, and my dear mother’s prayers came to my remembrance also. I thought of her letters, and how she had sought to direct me to the Lord.
Another week was spent in anguish, and then suddenly the light broke in upon my dark soul. Oh, what a flood of light it was! I saw the finished work of Christ, I accepted God’s salvation, and passed from misery to peace!
Many of my neighbors thought me mad, and so did most of my dear family at home, when I wrote them how the Lord had converted my son. However, more than eighteen years have passed since the Lord in His mercy turned me from darkness to light, and never yet has He allowed a doubt to come over my soul. I trust He never will.
Seven thousand miles I had come to seek the riches which perish, but the Lord gave eternal riches instead. Thus did He generously answer the last prayer I ever heard from my beloved mother’s lips, “God bless you, my son!”
One thing has often struck me since my conversion, that of the thousands of people I came across I did not meet a single person who showed the least tare for my soul. No one ever asked me, “Where are you going to spend eternity? “Yet the Lord had compassion on me, and sent me to that lonely Karoo farm that I might hear that all my righteousnesses were as “filthy rags,” that I had nothing to do in the work for salvation, and that I had only to trust the One who had done it.
Blessed be His name! To Him shall be all the praise and thanksgiving forever and ever! Amen!
S.―B. K.