SOME years ago, when residing in the south of Ireland, an incident occurred which I relate, hoping it may encourage others who live in that country. A woman who occasionally worked at my house told me one day that her husband was very ill. I felt greatly interested in hearing of him, and often inquired for him, even wishing my husband to go and see the man. Soon after, I heard he had been taken to the infirmary, and then that he had been discharged as incurable. A longing to help the man arose—unaccountably, I should say, were it not that we believe God surely uses His children as His ambassadors of mercy in this sorrowful world; and, my husband being ill, I determined to go myself and see him, feeling how solemn it was for a fellow-creature to be dying within reach of one who believed in the eternal realities of heaven and hell. I knew that the priest was visiting him, and I knew only too well how he would turn the truth of God into a lie, and exalt the creature more than the Creator, the Creator—who is also the Saviour, God— “who will have all men to be saved and to come into the knowledge of the truth.”
Taking some few bodily comforts with me, I accordingly went to his house, knocked, and asked his wife if I could see him. She looked much astonished, saying the priest had been, but I persevered in my request, and she said she would ask her husband. From an inside room I heard his reply— “She can if she likes” —and I entered. I gave him what I brought, and spoke to him of his suffering, to which he replied very indifferently as if my visit were quite an intrusion, turning away from me the while. I asked then, “Have you any hope of recovery?”
“No,” he replied; “the doctor says I can’t get better, I must die.”
“Poor man,” I said, “you must die, and where are you going?”
“Oh,” he said, “to purgatory; I must go to purgatory.”
“Oh, how dreadful,” I exclaimed; “purgatory; what a thought!”
“Yes,” he said, “there is nothing else for me but that.”
“But do you know that Jesus Christ has died to purge away our sins? He was the Sin-Bearer, the Substitute; He stood in our place, and bore the punishment that we deserved.” And I went on to quote many scriptures, and among them I especially dwelt on these texts, “Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the Just for the unjust, to bring us to God,” and “When he had, by Himself, purged our sins, He sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high.” He looked at me very earnestly, and I went on.
“Are you a sinner?” “Yes,” he replied, “I’ve been a great sinner.”
“Then,” I said, “do you know who Jesus came to save?”
“I suppose He came to save sinners, but I’m not quite sure, and the priest says I must go to purgatory because of my sins. I’m a poor man and have not the money to pay, and I’m miserable at thinking how long I shall be there.”
Much more in the same strain passed, and I left him with several texts to think over. When I asked him if I should come again he seemed anxious for me to do so, and I could not but hope that God had opened the door, though my poor friend had told me that the priest was shortly coming to give him absolution; still, I remembered “if God be for us, who can be against us?”
The second time I went, a few days later, he looked pleased to see me, and I found he had been thinking over our previous conversation. He asked me many questions, and seemed to have a gleam of hope that he might be delivered from purgatory, fear of that being the prevailing idea in his mind.
At my third visit, when I entered the room he met me with the words, “Ah, I see it all now; Jesus is my Sin-Bearer. Yes, He has purged away all my sins, I shall not go to purgatory.” And then he asked to heat more about the One who he knew had suffered for his sins. He had been a great sinner, but he had found a greater Saviour. He was getting very weak, and could not say much, but I left him calmly resting on the Lord Jesus, with the assurance that the work He had done on the cross availed for him, and that He would take huff safe home to glory.
This was the last time I saw him. Early one morning, a few days after, calling his wife to him he said, “Mary, I’m dying, but I’m going straight to Jesus—no purgatory for me. I bless God that I ever saw Mrs. J to show me the way to Jesus. I shall soon be with Him.”
J.