He lived in and was a native of Southern India, and had been taught from his infancy to worship and pray to fire and water.
In that part of India the British Government had a college for teaching English to native young men, so that they might qualify themselves for holding government situations as clerks, etc., in the government offices. And the head of this college was evidently one who respected, and I trust went further and believed God's blessed and precious written Word. So in teaching these native young men to read, a portion of the Holy Scriptures was read regularly each day by those who were able to do so. At first, full of prejudice and dark unbelief, the young man who is the subject of this narrative, disliked having to do this very much, and often Would show his contempt and dislike for the Bible, by kicking it about when he had opportunity, and even spitting upon it to show his fellow students perhaps, how little he cared for, or believed it. But one day, the reading lesson was in the 6th chapter of John's Gospel, and somehow or other the 37th verse fixed and fastened itself on his mind in a way that he could not shake off or forget, especially those words in it, "Him that cometh to Me, I will in no wise cast out.”
He even tried to forget them, but they were constantly returning upon him and coming up again in his mind.
Not very long after these things, a fire broke out in the cantonment close by, and in the endeavors to put down the flames, he found himself with others running with water to put out the fire. When all at once the thought struck him, that as a worshiper of fire and water, here was he, running with a bucket of water to put out the fire, or in other words, trying to put one god out with the other god. The absurdity and folly of what he had been brought up to believe, so took hold of him that he gave his old ideas entirely up and became an infidel, until one day as was often the custom of these students, he went down with another young man to bathe in the sea not very far from the college. It was usual for them to watch the time of the tide, and when it was at a certain height, to swim quite a long way out to sea, and when at a well known distance, to stop and touch bottom on a sand bar, on which they would rest and take breath, and then turn and swim ashore again. On this occasion, however, he had forgotten to notice the time of the tide, and striping off his clothes on the shore, he plunged into the sea, and swam as usual to about the distance from shore where he expected to touch the sand bar and rest before returning, as it was too far to turn and come right back again without resting. To his surprise and consternation when he attempted to touch bottom with his feet, he found no bottom at all, and then it all dawned upon him that he had mistaken the time and that the tide was up far above the sand bank, and now too exhausted to swim back to shore, he was helpless and hopeless, and nothing but death by drowning was before him. His companion had not followed him either, and even if he had desired, it was too far off to help him. He tried of course to keep himself up, but began to sink, and with death staring him in the face, began to look eternity in the face also. All his past life came up before him and here he was, his false gods gone, and nothing to lean upon or trust in, left, and the dreadful thought of going into eternity, and his own unfitness to do so, pressing deeply and powerfully on his terror-stricken soul. His agony was no doubt terrible. When, however, in this state, he began to remember those precious words again which he had read, and which had so impressed him some time back in the reading in John 6 and which he had tried to spurn away and reject at the time; "Him that cometh to Me, I will in no wise cast out.”
And half doubting and half believing, the poor perishing man cried out, "Lord Jesus, if there is such a person, I come to Thee.”
The gracious, loving, blessed Savior met him just as he was, and just where he was; and revealed Himself as a real living, loving Person and Savior to his soul, faithful to His own words as He always was and is, "Him that cometh to Me, I will in no Wise cast out.”
Meanwhile a boat had put off, some persons whom he had not noticed having seen his danger, and though he had gone down once or twice, they reached the spot just in time to save his life, and they took him into the boat and bore him safe to the shore.
Saved, not only from drowning, but from eternal misery too. Saved by the boatmen in God's providence, from a watery grave, and saved from an eternity without God and without Christ, in the awful misery of the lake of fire, by the Lord Jesus Christ. He at once confessed Christ to the one who had come down to bathe with him, but who only treated it as nonsense. He soon confessed Christ openly and boldly to his own relations, who went further, and utterly disowned him and even persecuted him for becoming a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ. He went over to England and obtained a situation there as a teacher of oriental languages in one of the colleges, and became also an earnest preacher of the gospel. And it was while preaching to a number of British soldiers that he told us of how the Lord Jesus met and saved his soul.
Reader, you must have to do, sooner or later, with that same Lord Jesus, either now as a Savior; or later, as a Judge.
Have you met Him yet? Have you ever come as this man did, as a poor, perishing sinner, to Himself to be' saved? If not drowning, you are getting nearer and nearer to that moment when death will plunge you into eternity, or when the Lord will come and shut the now wide open door, on all who are not ready.
O! that you may, if unsaved, wake up to the realities of eternity, and the reality of there being a living, loving, mighty Savior, who having accomplished the work that only He could do; that work that had to be done, or none could be saved, the work of atonement on the cross, now risen from the dead, and seated high in heavenly glory, still waits to save sinners, still fulfills His own precious words, that were so blessed to this poor heathen, "Him that cometh to Me, I will in no wise cast out." John 6:3737All that the Father giveth me shall come to me; and him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out. (John 6:37).