Catherine’s Bible

 •  3 min. read  •  grade level: 8
 
A FEW years ago the Lord Jesus called a schoolgirl of sixteen years old, named Catherine, home to Himself in heaven. She loved the Lord Jesus Christ, and it comforted her parents to know that she had entered into great joy, which would never be broken into by sorrow, as so often happens here on earth.
She left behind some precious things, amongst them her Bible and her diary. I wonder if you were to die, would your parents know that you were happy forever with Jesus?
Catherine's Bible was underlined in places. A few words and sentences which had been specially loved by her were marked in this way. You can imagine how these underlined sentences comforted her mother, for it showed her what her daughter had especially valued.
The first word that her mother noticed marked was on the first page, the first printed page, before the Bible begins, the word Holy. If you open your Bible at the very beginning you will read, "The Holy Bible, containing the Old and New Testaments." Catherine's mother understood why that one word Holy was underlined, for they had often talked about God's holy word, and how although printed like any other book, it was the living, imperishable voice of God to men.
The Bible in many schools and colleges is treated as a classic, as Shakespeare or Milton, or any great literary work; but God's word is not like other books, nor is it the work of any man, but given from God's own mouth. It will live and speak and be fulfilled when every earthly book has disappeared.
“The grass withereth, the flower fadeth: but the word of our God shall stand forever." (Isa. 40:88The grass withereth, the flower fadeth: but the word of our God shall stand for ever. (Isaiah 40:8).) This is what the Prophet Isaiah tells us in the Old Testament, and Peter says the same in the New, "For all flesh is as grass, and all the glory of man as the flower of grass. The grass withereth, and the flower thereof falleth away: but the word of the Lord endureth forever." (1 Peter 1:24, 2524For all flesh is as grass, and all the glory of man as the flower of grass. The grass withereth, and the flower thereof falleth away: 25But the word of the Lord endureth for ever. And this is the word which by the gospel is preached unto you. (1 Peter 1:24‑25).)
Catherine knew this, and loved and honored the holy book. Her mother turned over the pages carefully, for all that her daughter had marked and thought and written was very precious to her in her sorrow, and she came to the Book of Psalms. In Psa. 51, at the seventh verse, she found another underlining. The verse was: "Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean: wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow." In the margin was written, "He has, He has." What did she mean? Her mother knew; she meant that He, the Lord Jesus, had washed her, and that she was whiter than snow.
Catherine's relations all knew that she belonged to the Lord Jesus, she confessed Him gladly, but there in her Bible was another witness to the fact that she belonged to the Lord, who had washed her and given her "an inheritance among them that are sanctified.”
I wonder if you, who are reading this, whether boy or girl, have first believed in your heart and then confessed with your mouth the Lord Jesus? If this is so, then should you be called away from this earth, like . Catherine, you will be taken to be with Jesus, where He is, for He must have all His own to be with Him.
Every Christian child is valuable to Christ, for He has bought His own, and the price He paid was His own life. He laid it down for every believing boy or girl. He gave Himself for His sheep. He said Himself when on earth, "I am the good shepherd: the good shepherd giveth his life for the sheep." (John 10:1111I am the good shepherd: the good shepherd giveth his life for the sheep. (John 10:11))