We had been holding gospel meetings for several nights. On some evenings a young Jewish woman was seen in the audience. Her husband, a social-minded man, was in the habit of spending his evenings out with friends, while his wife, of a more serious nature, most often remained at home.
With the meetings being held nearby, curiosity led her to come to one of our services. The first evening's message left no particular impression. The question simply arose fleetingly in her mind: "Suppose that Jesus were the Messiah?"
She came the next night, and again Jesus was preached. Before the service was over the question became more than a question. She said to herself, "Jesus was perhaps the Messiah," and it greatly distressed her.
On the third night the thought seized her soul and shook it through and through: "Jesus was the Messiah!"
Of course there came with it the conviction: "I am lost forever, for my people killed Him."
Her husband came home at midnight. She met him in tears and said at once, "Go to some Christian neighbor and borrow for me a New Testament."
He tried to laugh her out of her depression, then to argue her out of it, but it was of no use. So, because he loved her, he went out at twelve thirty that night and rang a Christian neighbor's doorbell. When he came to the door, the caller said, "I beg your pardon for disturbing you, but will you be so kind as to lend me a New Testament?"
The request was cheerfully granted. The neighbor thought: "There is a work in that house to be done for Jesus tonight!" As soon as he could get dressed he hurried to the home of a Christian brother, and together they went to the Jewish home.
The door was instantly opened, and the woman met them with a welcoming smile. Her greeting was: "I have found Jesus, the Messiah!"
Then she told her story. She said that when her husband gave her the New Testament she could not speak. But she went into her room and, kneeling, lifted up her face toward heaven, crying, "O LORD GOD of my fathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, give me light! Give me light!"
Keeping her eyes closed she opened the Testament. When she opened her eyes, the Scripture before her was the beginning of the letter to the Romans.
She read slowly, and the verses went tearing through her soul like thunderbolts until she came to the sixteenth verse: For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth; to the Jew first—there she stopped. Her tears blinded her. She looked again.
To the Jew first, and also to the Greek.
As she read these words she believed them and she knew her Messiah must be Christ Jesus, the Lord. When the Christians came she was rejoicing in her new-found hope and ready to confess Him before men.
For there is no difference between the Jew and the Greek: for the same Lord over all is rich unto all that call upon Him. For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. (Rom. 10:12, 13.)
“Man of sorrows," what a name
For the Son of God, who came,
Ruined sinners to reclaim.
Hallelujah! What a Savior!