While we were traveling through the Great Smokies of North Carolina, we had a most happy visit with a dear old man. His life was devoted to carrying the good news of God's salvation deep Into the mountains and valleys of his native state. One night he told us of his own conversion. This is his story.
I was converted to God in my youth, when only a lad of about fourteen or fifteen years of age. I have grown old in His service, but I have never regretted He found me, so very early in life.
What brought me to Christ were simple everyday affairs, with no great manifestations at any particular time—just the hand of the Lord in His gracious providence, bringing things to pass after His own fashion. Though many Christians can point to the exact time of their conversion, I cannot tell the day, nor the week, nor the month even, when the line was crossed and I became a child of God through grace. It was a gradual dawning of light; and it is blessed to know that one is born again, though he may be ignorant of the moment of his new birth.
I was born and reared in the town of Asheville, North Carolina. It was then but a small town amid the beautiful mountains in this "land of the sky," this so-called "Switzerland of America," and indeed it is a beautiful region.
In my early school days I had a chum about my own age, a boy whose family had moved from Charleston, S.C., to our mountain town. Through his mother's prayers, training, and influence, he was firmly convinced that, when old enough, he should become a preacher of the gospel.
Often I laughed at my young friend and ridiculed his determination. I would say to him that to be an old long-faced preacher was the last thing I'd want. He always rebuked my folly and stood true to his purpose. We were much together, as two boys will be; and wherever you found one, you would generally find the other. But he was a regular attendant at a young people's prayer-meeting held once a week in the back room of the little church, and there I seldom went.
Across the mountain range east of the town, and some three miles over in the next valley was a wonderful old swimming hole. It was found in the mountain river called in the mellow Cherokee Indian tongue, "Swannanoa," which means beautiful. No prettier stream ever wended its way seaward than the Swannanoa of that time.
Once, with my oldest brother, I had spent some hours fishing along its rhododendron-clad banks. Coming finally to the swimming hole I plunged in at a point where it was usually not very deep, as I had not learned to swim very well at that time. On that day the river was swollen by recent rains and the current was strong. I was caught in the swift moving tide and carried down toward a deeper place below. In terror of drowning, I called for help.
A tree leaned far out over the water just there. My brother ran out on it and extended his fishing pole to me. Just in time I caught hold of the end of it and was safely brought to shore.
Not long after this, my chum came by my home to get me to go with him across the mountain for a dip in the river. I was away at the time, so my younger brother and some small boys went along. Reaching the place, he undressed and jumped in as I had done, in the shallow part above the leaning tree. But again the stream was swollen by recent rains and the current caught him as it had me. He was borne down toward the deep hole below, unable to swim out. This time there was no boy with a fishing rod to reach him; and the little fellows on the bank in their helplessness saw him sink beneath the waters. Soon the rippling waves completely hid from their terror-stricken eyes all signs of the simple tragedy just enacted.
When I reached home about dusk, my mother with trembling voice informed me what had occurred. I was shocked beyond speech; and without any appetite for supper, I made my way to my bed upstairs.
Sleep, however, would not come. Near midnight I arose and dressed. Slipping out the back door, I followed the path up the mountain and down into the valley on the other side. Before dawn I stood under the pale moonlight, a lonely, saddened boy on the bank of the old swimming hole. Through falling tears I gazed into the running water of the river. Somewhere underneath was the dead body of my boyhood friend.
Then it was that God spoke to me in my inmost heart. He seemed to say, "Suppose I had opened the gate of death and let you go through when this stream had you in its grasp. Where would you have been?”
The boy taken was ready to meet God, but I was not. I say it was then that God spoke to me, but other things in my life about that time also had a bearing; and somewhere along the line I knew I was saved.
The body of my dear friend was found days later, on a Tuesday. It was boxed up and placed in the entrance of the church, awaiting burial. That night I had an impulse to go to the young people's meeting. I passed by the casket in the front of the church; and with a silent prayer for help I took my place in the little circle in the back room, in the very seat of the dead boy. Somehow I feel that God has kept me in his place ever since. Instead: of sending him out as the preacher, He took him in His providence through the gate of death. Through my love and sorrow for my dead friend, God thereby touched my life, and turned me into the path which otherwise my playmate might have trod.
And now, my reader, if called to die, are you ready to meet God? I pray you, take life eternal as the free gift of God purchased for you by Christ's death on the cross of Calvary.