Away out in the old Somme region, one morning, we were holding the trench and came in for the usual shelling. Presently there was a black cloud as a shell burst and pieces of shrapnel came whizzing past us, and poor Bert fell like a log. Jim and another chap jumped down and picked him up, but they saw at a glance that it was a hopeless case. There was not a dressing station nearby, so some fellows got some empty sandbags and an old coat, and laid Bert on them in the bottom of the trench to die.
Before long Jim was startled by a voice behind him, “Can you tell me the way to heaven?”
Jim jumped down again beside Bert and said, “The way to heaven? Sorry, chum, I don’t know. I’ll ask the other fellows.”
He returned to the firing step and walked along to the next man and asked him, but he did not know. So the question was passed along the Traverse Trench from man to man. “Bert is dying. He wants to know the way to heaven. Can you tell him?” The question had got right along the trench to No. 16, but out of those sixteen not one knew the way to heaven! Just think of it! Sixteen young fellows brought up in a so-called Christian land, but they could not help a dying comrade! When you see an old friend dying and you cannot help him, it goes hard. What you think and guess just won’t do. Oh, no! He wants the real thing. How many there are like those sixteen! How about it? Could you turn me to the Old Book and give me chapter and verse for God’s Way to heaven?
So No. 16 jumped off the firing step and went rushing on to the next post, where, all alone, stood another on the alert. He felt a thump on his back and heard a voice shouting, “There’s a chap in our company who has been hit; he is dying and he wants to know the way to heaven. Can you tell him?”
Turning around, and with a smile lighting up his face, he replied, “Yes.” He thrust his hand into his shirt pocket and pulled out a New Testament. Quickly turning over its pages he said, “Look here, that verse marked with pencil. I’ll fold the pages back. Put your thumb on that verse. Tell him that is the way.”
Quickly No. 16 rushed back, passed the message and Testament on from man to man and soon Jim had it in his hand. He dropped down beside Bert, who lay there so still. He touched his shoulder; slowly Bert opened his eyes. “I’ve got it, Bert, old chum. Here it is; the way to heaven: “For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”
Peace came over Bert’s face, as he kept gasping out “whosoever.” After a bit, he lay quiet and still again. All at once with one great effort raising himself, his hands stretched upwards; his face lit up, with one last gasp, “Whosoever,” he fell back dead. What a change — from the battlefield to be with Christ!
Dear friends, as an old soldier, who now himself has also found the way, let me assure you that this is the real thing. Jesus is the real Saviour. Jesus who said, “I am the door: by Me if any man enter in, he shall be saved.” (John 10:9). Jesus who died, the Just One, for us, the unjust, that He might bring us to God; Himself, now seated at God’s right hand crowned with glory and honor. He is the only Saviour and the only Way to heaven.
“Neither is there salvation in any other: for there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved” (Acts 4:12).