The Sunday evening service was ended. Henry, the young village preacher, wearily wended his homeward way through the chilly autumnal twilight. The road ran for some distance along a gloomy valley; and, as the cold wind swept the damp air past him, a great depression fell on the young man's spirit. He felt, as never before, what a feeble instrument he was for the Lord's service.
He began to question within himself whether he ought ever to have put his hand to this mighty work, for which he judged himself so little fitted. In his despondence he doubted if any had received, or ever would receive, the least blessing through his poor efforts to tell the story of the Lamb of God.
As he neared the town where he lived, the intense melancholy seemed but to deepen, until his sad train of thoughts was interrupted abruptly by a young man who, walking briskly towards him, asked, "Can you tell me if I am on the right road for Jonesville?"
"No," answered Henry. "You must go about a hundred yards back, then turn to your right, when you will easily find it."
He was passing on, but the stranger caught sight of his face, as they came under a lamp-post, and exclaimed, "Surely I have seen you before!"
"I have no recollection of you," replied Henry. "Well, tell me, did you not preach some six weeks back in Belleville?"
"Yes, I did," responded Henry sadly, ready with renewed depression to wish he had not done so. "Were you present?"
"That I was," answered the young man warmly; "and many a time have I longed to meet you again, for the words you spoke that night led me to turn to the Lord. I have now found the Savior of whom you spoke, and I have life in Him. I am a new creature in Christ Jesus.
"I see now why I have been allowed to lose time by going out of my road in this fashion. I hesitated yonder as to which turning I should take, and felt half put out when your words showed me I had taken the wrong one after all. Now I see the Lord led me here that I might meet you. Oh, how good of Him to let me set eyes on you again!"
"Ah!" said Henry, as he heartily grasped the hand extended to him. "You know but half the story of the Lord's loving-kindness in letting us thus meet. I must tell you my side of it."
As they walked on together, with a full heart the young evangelist told his companion of his sorrowful thoughts of that evening, in the deep discouragement he had been laboring under as to his service for the Master; and how, in their unexpected meeting, he had had a fresh proof of his loving Master's tender thought for His faltering and fainthearted servant, by giving him such a mark of His approval of his ministry.
They parted; and Henry, with a light step and glad heart, pursued his solitary path, resolving, by the grace of God, to be "in labors more abundant," believing that these would not be in vain in the Lord, who "giveth the increase."