Dr. Rader was putting on his overcoat in the vestry of the chapel at the close of the usual week-night service. In response to a tap at the door he said, "Come in!" The door opened and an elderly man, a gardener in the neighborhood, entered, looking a little nervous and undecided. "Well, my friend," said the doctor, in his brisk tones, "can I do anything for you? Did you want to speak to me?”
"Yes, sir, if you please.”
"Sit down then," continued the doctor, offering the man a chair. The latter, however, remained standing.
"You said you wanted to speak to me; is it upon spiritual things?" asked the doctor.
The man's lips moved and he essayed to speak, but words did not come readily. He held an old, soft felt hat in his hand, which he kept turning round and round in a nervous, helpless manner. The silence was becoming awkward, when at last he said, "If you please, sir—I—I've been thinking—I've been thinking—that—" This was repeated with slight variations several times, when Dr. Rader, wishing to help the man, said, "What have you been thinking, my friend?”
The previous scene was repeated, but at last he blurted out the words, "I've been thinking, sir, it's time I got saved, and—”
The good doctor looked at him, at his gray hair and wrinkled face; and as he listened to his confession and thought of his age, which was nearing sixty, he felt something startling was needed to bring this slow, stolid man to his senses. Springing to his feet, he cried, "`Thinking'— `thinking,' my good fellow; 'thinking' for sixty years about getting saved, and still under condemnation, without hope of heaven, with a fearful looking for of judgment at the last! 'Thinking' it is time to get saved! Oh man, get down on your knees at once, confess your sins to God, ask Him to pardon you for the sake of His Son, Jesus Christ. Why, you may never see another sun rise, and you would go down to hell 'thinking!' `thinking!' thinking!’—but yet lost!”
The man was truly startled. Thus suddenly aroused from his dangerous ease to see his awful danger, he sought earnestly, and obtained freely, God's mercy, and lived thenceforward a Christian life. But he was full of regret that he had put off salvation so long, and he often felt also what a terrible risk he had run.
You who read these words, whosoever you may be, are you ready to meet God? Thinking will not save you. The danger of delay in this matter of your soul's salvation is becoming more and more imminent. God loves you! Christ died for you! Will you believe it? Will you receive Him now?
"Redeemed ... .with the
precious blood
of Christ.”