I was big enough and old enough to do what we call in Scotland "join the church," but I knew I had not the great qualification for that. I knew my father and mother wished me to join, but I could not do it simply to please them. God had made me honest enough to know the blackness of my heart, and that even if my sins had not all hatched out, still the eggs were all there. I was never bothered with self-righteousness!
In perplexity I wrote to an old Christian friend. There is a verse in Acts 16:3131And they said, Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved, and thy house. (Acts 16:31) which says, "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved." I put that text in my letter, and I wrote: "I believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, all about Jesus, and all the Bible says of sin and salvation and heaven and hell. I believe all about it, but I don't feel one bit better. There is something wrong."
Two or three days afterward I was just going to open up the ticket office window to sell the tickets for the 10:30 business train to Glasgow. The postman was just coming round. He gave me a letter, and I recognized my old friend's handwriting. I will never forget reading that letter!
This is how it began: "You will never know how glad I am to get a frank, open, honest letter from you about your spiritual condition, even though you are evidently all in the dark. I am glad you have taken Acts 16:3131And they said, Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved, and thy house. (Acts 16:31) as a challenge text. It says, 'Believe,' in your heart of course, as you believe in your mother or your father, for it is faith and not a proposition of Euclid, but 'believe on [have full confidence in] the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved.'
"But John, you say you believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and don't feel a bit the better for it. Now, I want to know which I am to believe about you. Am I to believe yourself saying, 'I don't feel a bit better,' or am I to believe God when He says that the man who believes in the Lord Jesus Christ is and shall be eternally saved?
"John, you would quote the text of Acts 16:3131And they said, Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved, and thy house. (Acts 16:31) as if it read, 'Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you will feel easier,' instead of 'Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved.' God says it. Never mind your feelings!"
It was like the lifting of a curtain for me, and I saw it all bold and clear. I was saved! No great feeling came even then; I just knew it was so.
I took a walk in the station, alone, to the far end of the platform. I remember saying to myself, "Has the station been whitewashed?" The very dingy brick wall, all covered with smoke and soot from the engines, looked whiter! But it was not the walls, it was my mind that was brightened, because now I knew the Lord as mine.
The next morning I woke up, and my heart was just like a fire you had left burning over night. I was as cold as could be. The devil said, "It's all a hoax."
But I got grace to fight that battle. I rallied myself: "Has God's word altered through the night?"
"No."
"No.”
"Has the value of the blood of Jesus to blot out my sins altered?"
"No!"
"Then nothing has altered that I am resting on, nothing but my feelings. And you don't need to rest on your feelings you are saved by trusting the Lord Jesus Christ."
"What must I do to be saved?"