“Verily, verily, I say unto you, he that heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from death unto life.” (John 5:2424Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from death unto life. (John 5:24).)
A hot north wind blew as I started across the paddock that lay between me and the dwelling in which lived a woman who was in deep anxiety about her soul. I had been staying at a farmhouse in the bush, and had heard of the deep exercise of soul she appeared to have passed through for some two years. A few days previously she had been overtaken by a neighbor as he was driving in to the meeting house they attended, and which was situate some three miles from where she dwelt, trudging through the heavy rain on her way to the same place to hear the word of God. As he stopped to take her up, he asked her why she ventured out on such a day, when she replied, “Oh, I daren’t stay at home, my soul’s at stake.”
Entering the house, I found her busy cutting potatoes, which the children were carrying out and planting in the furrows made in the land adjoining the house where the father was plowing.
Seating myself on a form to which I was directed, I inquired, “Well, Mrs. M., how are you today?”—I had seen her once before at a meeting. She replied, “Very well in health, thank you, sir.”
“But what about the soul?” “Bad enough, sir, as bad as it can be. I get no rest, no peace, yet I see kit. I go to hear the word of God, and feel happy sometimes when listening, but then it all goes and I feel worse than ever, but then I don’t deserve it. I lived for five years near Mr. W., yet never went to hear him preach until two years ago. I felt very unhappy, and thought I must go. I went, and the word of God seemed to plow up my very soul, and ever since then, when thinking of my past life, I feel as it were all ground up.”
“But how is that; have you not read what Jesus did for such sinners as you?”
“Oh, yes; but how may I know it is for me?”
“Do you believe the Bible is the word of God?”
“Yes, every word of it; I was reading it as you came in” (reaching an old worn Bible from a sack of potatoes behind her).
“Have you ever read the twenty-fourth verse of John 5?”
“I have read it all many times.”
“You have your Bible, will you kindly read that verse?”
Turning to it she read, “Verily, verily, I say unto you, he that heareth my word and believeth on him that sent me hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation, but is passed from death unto life.”
“Ah! that’s very beautiful, but it’s not for me: I don’t believe aright.”
“Now will you kindly read that again, and see if it says anything about believing aright.”
Again she read it, and now the Spirit of God applied the word to the liberation of a soul so long in bondage. The next few minutes were occupied by her in reading again and again this most precious statement of gospel truth, making her own comments after each reading.
It needed not that I should make further remark. God had given entrance to His word, which gave light and understanding to the simple.
At the second reading, she replied, in answer to my question, “Well, no; it says nothing about believing aright; dear me, I never read it so before; I must read that again:” and turning the leaf down, put the book on the table, but immediately took it up again, and read it a third time, saying, “Well, that’s wonderful;” ‘Believeth on him that sent me.’ I do believe God sent Him. “HATH everlasting life!”
Sympathetic tears found their way to my eyes, as, on receiving His truth, her long harassed and pent up feelings found vent in tears of joy.
After some few minutes thus alternately reading and commenting aloud, her husband came in, when thrusting the book before him, she said, “See here what has been shown me. Read that verse.”
The old man took the book and stood in the doorway through which the noonday Australian sun was pouring its brilliant light and served to show to him the words of the book, and to me the furrowed face and scant grisly locks which spoke of many years’ hard usage in this scene. But the eyes, suffused with tears as he read, told that God had not permitted his heart to be hardened withal.
After reading, he asked, “How many kinds of faith are there?” which showed the secret of the expression, believing aright, used by his wife.
(He was afterward referred to the “One faith,” spoken of in Eph. 4, which has been lost sight of in theological differences and phases of faith.)
A little further conversation, and we knelt down to thank God for His mercy in thus delivering a soul from the trammels of sin, and the bondage of Satan.
As I left the cottage, with the sudden changes peculiar to the Australian climate, a cool south wind sprang up, refreshing everything in nature. I could not but reflect how true an emblem these winds were of the state of soul of the one I had just left, and how with as sudden a transition she had passed from that condition which David describes in such words as these, “my moisture is turned into the drought of summer,” into that in which he calls upon the righteous with whom is the sense of forgiveness to “be glad in the Lord and rejoice” and to “shout for joy.”
Reader, if you are experiencing “soul trouble,” let me direct your attention to that much blessed verse spoken by Him, who is the source of eternal truth. It is prefaced with two words of assurance for your feeble faith, “Verily, verily” (truly, truly), “He [whosoever] that heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent me”—this is to honor Him, which the unbelieving Jews around the Lord Jesus refused to do.
The first point here is to hear His word. You cannot now hear it falling from His gracious lips but, blessed be His name, it is recorded in the book of eternal truth, and there you may read and hear. The second is to “believe on God [the Father] who sent him [the Son].” Of him who does this, He, who never lied, declares three things to be true: 1. He “HATH everlasting life.” 2. “He shall not come into condemnation [judgment].” 3. But IS passed from death unto LIFE.”
Oh! let His word fall into your soul as it is written without “if” or “ but,” and then shall the peace of God that passeth all understanding keep your hearts and minds.
“Oh,” said one, after hearing that verse read to him several times, and the beauty of it pointed out, “Oh, I see it now; it’s that little word ‘HATH.’ What a fool I’ve been! I’ll go home and pray about that little word ‘HATH.’” G. J. S.