A group of happy children started off bright and early one summer day to go on a Sunday school picnic. Kind friends supplied cars and one man loaned his truck, which was gaily decorated for the occasion. They were to spend the day at an estate out in the country, and go hiking in the woods. High walls and fences and several big iron gates enclosed the picnic area.
All went well, and the children had lots of fun rambling through the woods, and playing hide and seek. Last but not least, they enjoyed sit ting on the benches, all stacked high with sandwiches and cakes and cold drinks. Then it was arranged that all should gather in front of the big mansion where lived the lady who owned the farm. They were to sing a few hymns, hear a short gospel address, and then the good lady was to present each child with a prize.
When the children and all were gathered ready to go home, it was pound that one little girl named Mary was missing. The last that had been seen of her was when she was gathering flowers in the woods. They searched far and wide for Mary but she could not be found. Sorrowfully, and very reluctantly, the group had to return home without her, while some of the men who worked on the big farm set out to search for her.
As they were coming back along the road, who should be standing inside one of the big locked iron gates, but the missing Mary. She had lost her way, and wandered in the wrong direction, always thinking she would join the other children. When she saw the gate, she thought surely she must be near them then, but alas, it was the wrong gate; it was closed so that she was a prisoner. The kindhearted men spoke a few words of comfort to Mary while one of them ran to get a key to open the gate. It wasn’t long before Mary was on her way home to her village where she was welcomed by her parents with joy.
The next day at Sunday school, when the speaker was addressing the children, he said, pointing to little Mary who sat in the front seat, “One of our Sunday school girls was lost yesterday. She was trying to find her way back, when she ran into a trap and was imprisoned between two big locked gates.” The speaker went on to say that this was very much like we all are as sinners. First we were wanderers from God, and next, in seeking to find our way back, we take many ways of our own choosing, with the result that we become more hopelessly lost than before. Little Mary was found and set free by others who went out to seek her; and so the Lord Jesus, the Son of God, has come to seek and to save that which was lost. He has opened the gates of death and judgment, which were closed between us and heaven, and now all who believe and put their trust in Him are set free, and will soon be brought home to glory.
The children listened very attentively. The incident of how little Mary was lost and found seemed to give point to the gospel, and for many a day they remembered the barred gates and the little prisoner. Mary did not forget it herself, and now she delights to tell the simple story of her early days to a class of bright little girls, whom she seeks to lead to Jesus, the Saviour of sinners, the One whose saving grace and delivering power she has herself known for many years.
The Lord Jesus while on earth told His people: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me, because He hath annointed Me to preach the gospel to the poor; He hath sent Me to heal the broken-hearted; to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised, to preach the acceptable year of the Lord.” Luke 4:18, 1918The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised, 19To preach the acceptable year of the Lord. (Luke 4:18‑19).
ML-08/23/1964