IT was thirty years ago, last December, and the storm was raging with wildest fury outside, just as it rages now and beats on the window pane, making the long, tall plumes of the poplars howl and shake in the gale. Tonight it is only rain with the wind, that night it was a storm of fine hail and snow.
It was warm and bright in the office, where we were busy working at our desks and tables, but it was Thursday evening, and I was accustomed to give an address every Thursday evening about eight o’clock, at a roadside school nearly three miles distant. My office companions knew this, and had often helped me to finish my work so that I might be away in time, while my master had gladly given me permission to go away before the office was closed.
Feeling that it was about time to get ready, I laid aside my work, and was about to put on my plaid, when a young, raw lad, whom we had but lately got in to help with some writing, looked me straight in the face, and said “Mr. S., you are never going to B― tonight.”
“Yes, John,” I. said,” if it please God, I mean to be there.”
“It’s impossible, I tell you; you can’t do it, “was the response.” I know that road, and tonight it can’t be done; at least,” he added, “you can’t do it.”
He spoke emphatically, earnestly, and I felt he meant it; indeed, he realized what I did not dream of. Three miles of a road unprotected by hill, tree, house, or wall―skirting the ocean and meeting the storm all the way. I know now how foolish I was, not even to think of the storm, when I said, “I mean to try.”
Perhaps it was because I had been much in prayer about the meeting that afternoon, and my heart had been drawn out to contemplate the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, that I felt as if God were really giving me a message, and even already my mind was full of such words as, “He, everyone that thirsteth, come ye to the waters,” “If any man thirst, let him come unto Me, and drink,” and, “Whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely.”
“You’ll be smothered in the snow,” was the last kind suggestion of my young stalwart friend, as he held his pen and compressed his lips as firmly. “Well,” he said, “if I can’t dissuade you from going, I’ll go with you.” The pen was laid down, and the young man rose to his full height of something more than six feet, and putting on a long, white woolen scarf, and buttoning his jacket tightly round his body, with cap in hand, was ready.
In two minutes we were out of the town and on the road, and then I began to feel that he was the wiser of the two.
Still I pushed on, unwilling to return or to give it up. Silently, holding our teeth fast clenched together, we fought our way on. For a time, I kept side by side with my comrade, but gradually I found myself just a step or two behind him, and even this was a slight and agreeable shelter. He met the blast in all its force as it broke on him ‘ere it reached me, but this was not enough, and I shall never forget how, at length, I pleaded for a rest.
“No,” he said, “if we stop, it will cost us our lives; cover your head with your plaid, and give me your hand.” I did so, and found it a pleasant relief, and on went the tall, big-boned, poorly-clad fellow, pulling me after him, until we had reached the shelter of the hill and had passed out of danger, and could stop to rest.
I little dreamed that the stalwart lad who so boldly met the blast for me that night, and saved my life, was to be for many after year a highland minister, trudging across the mountains and the moors, and through the forest of his wide-spread parishes, to carry the news of redeeming love to those who dwelt in darkness. Nor did I dream that he who held my hand, and pulled me on, was to be the father and helper of many a preacher in coming years.
As I thanked him for his company and help, I rejoiced to find that he meant to be a hearer, and also to see me safe home again Inwardly I blessed God, and if ever a grateful and earnest prayer rose from my heart it was for him.
The schoolroom was situated under the hill, and the few houses around it were sheltered from the fury of the gale, so that we found we had not come to speak to an empty building. During the hour of preaching I could see the eyes of my young friend steadily fixed or me, the same compressed lips which I had noticed before, and an expression full of deer earnestness.
I pressed the cry of Isa. 55, God in grace offering to every thirsty one, and to every needy one, living water, and, later on, God, through His Son, saying, “If any mar thirst, let him come unto Me, and drink,” and then the last invitation coming from the throne, “Let him that is athirst come; and whosoever will, let him take the water of lift freely.”
The meeting over, and a cup of tea, which a kind friend had provided, having been right gladly received, my young friend and I be took ourselves to the road, but the wind was now behind us, and we got comfortably along.
Glad of the opportunity, I followed up the subject, and spoke of God’s grace and love to me, how truly I had once felt my need, and sought the Lord, and had found in my own experience that this living water is a reality. My friend maintained a dead silence, and in the darkness I could not tell how my words were received. Thinking I might be wearying him, I asked, “Would you like me to change the conversation?” Then, for the first time, he stopped, and stretching out his long, bony arms and laying a hand on each of my shoulders, he said, looking me straight in the face, “I charge you to tell me all you know about it, for oh, I want a drink.”
Thus encouraged, I continued, but as we parted, he seemed as much in the dark as ever, and we arranged to meet on the following morning at daybreak.
Arriving at his house somewhat too early, I could see through the uncurtained window my young friend lighting the fire for his old mother then he sat down on one side of it and laid the family Bible upon his knees, read a portion and quietly knelt to pray. I slipped away unperceived, but cheered, feeling he was one of the right sort, and saying to myself, “God knows whom He has chosen.”
We met and conversed for an hour at least; his chief difficulty was, the need of repentance, faith, and good works, before one could hope to be accepted of God. He admitted that he had been seeking by prayer, by reading and reformation, to get right with God for a long time; for he said, “My highest ambition is to be a preacher, but I know I must be born again first. I won’t be a hypocrite; you have it now, I admit. I must get what you have got.”
Then I said, “My dear brother, if you want what I have got, and in the way I got it, I tell you that all the time I spent reading about it seemed lost, for I became more confused, and trying to reform seemed hopeless, for I grew worse every day, and more dissatisfied with myself. I could not pray, my sins seemed to rise before me in a hopeless mass, and an open hell lay before me; there seemed no escape for me, no hope unless the Lord Jesus would take pity on me.
“In this condition a thought passed through my mind: ‘Oh, if I had been on earth when Jesus was here, I would have gone any distance to ask Him to have mercy on me.’ And then I thought of the blind beggar at the roadside who could not see Jesus, but who cried to an unseen one, and shutting my eyes and falling on my knees, I pleaded, ‘O Lord, have mercy on me.’ I was about to add, ‘If I perish, I will perish at Thy feet,’ for I had no faith to believe I should there and then obtain mercy; but before I could say this, the Lord had saved me, the burden was gone, my conscience was purged, and my heart was full of love to Him whom I now knew as my Saviour. Two minutes before, all was like the gloom of hell, now all was of mercy, and all was of grace, so that I could say, All honor to the Lord, none to me.’”
John thanked me for the trouble I had taken about his soul, and said he had gleams of light and began to see the way, and he asked me to pray for him, that he might be saved and come to the knowledge of truth.
The following day, he could speak definitely of having also obtained mercy, and before a month had passed, he was preaching at the schoolroom, of the Lord who had found him of the Lord whose he is and whom he still serves. J. S.