Will Ogilvie came to us from the North County, broken in health, hoping by a stay in the healthful climate of the great South-west to arrest the ravages of tuberculosis and to regain his physical strength. With nothing else to do but to eat and to rest, his thoughts often turned to the "great beyond." Before this he had given eternity little thought. Now it became a matter of supreme interest, for he discovered that he was not prepared to meet God.
An earnest Christian, a forest ranger, near whose cabin Will had taken up his abode, repeatedly sought to lead him to Christ, but although he listened reverently to every plea made, yet his only reply was that it would not be fair after ruining his life in sin to offer God the wreck at the close. He was still too much of a gentleman to do that!
He was in this frame of mind when I met him some time later at a sanatorium where he had gone to spend his last days on earth.
I spoke to him earnestly about his soul's salvation, and sought to point him to Christ, the sinner's Savior. But in response I only got the same excuse that he had offered to the forest ranger. "I'll not offer God the wreck now," he said.
After a moment's reflection I asked him how it might be if he could stay here another fifty years; would the wreck be better or worse? To this he replied that he did not see how it could be any worse, but neither had he any hopes of making it better, for he had tried that.
Then I said to him, "Has it ever occurred to you, Will, that you were a wreck to begin with?"
"A wreck to begin with! What do you mean?"
"Just what David meant when he said, `Behold, I was shapen in iniquity; and in sin did my mother conceive me.' Psalm 51:55Behold, I was shapen in iniquity; and in sin did my mother conceive me. (Psalm 51:5). And that is why the best of men, such as Nicodemus, 'must be born again.' "
The light now began to break into Will's soul. He saw what a helpless sinner he was, and always had been. And then it became easy to point him to the blessed Son of God who "came to seek and to save that which was lost."
Will now asked for a Bible. It was a pleasure to see how he enjoyed the Word of God, especially Paul's epistle to the Romans, which shows how a sinner can be justified.
That he had peace with God was evident from the manner in which he henceforth lived and died. At the last he said to me, "Peace with God," and a smile broke over his face as he clasped my hands in his and we took leave of each other till that "morning without clouds."
Reader, if unsaved as Will was, you too are a moral wreck. Flee now to Will's Savior, "who was delivered for our offenses, and was raised again for our justification," and then you too will be able to say, "Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ."