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Edited By Heymen Wreford
MAY I say, this little paper is not only for grandfathers, but for any man who has been converted in old age? And, oh! young man, remember youth is the most likely and the best time to be converted. “Remember now thy Creator in the days of thy youth,” said king Solomon in his old age, when he summed up life with the divine seal “Fear God, and keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty of man” (Eccl. 12:13-1413Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter: Fear God, and keep his commandments: for this is the whole duty of man. 14For God shall bring every work into judgment, with every secret thing, whether it be good, or whether it be evil. (Ecclesiastes 12:13‑14)). Comparatively, very seldom are men and women turned from darkness to light in old age. But some are, thank God, as perhaps some of you read in the July number of this magazine, where I told of that wonderful case of conversion, owing to a seed sown in a boy’s heart by God the Holy Spirit through Flavel’s last sermon, and how, when that boy was past eighty, he worked to bring souls to God.
Well, my aged friend, if now God has opened your eyes to see you are a sinner, and He has given you light by leading you to faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, fear not; begin at once to speak and act for Him, just like, I think, that wicked king Manasseh did. Doubtless as a child he had been brought up by his righteous father, Hezekiah, to know and fear God, and yet he turned out to be the very worst king Judah ever had. Read for yourselves his history in 2 Chronicles 33 and 2 Kings 21. Observe, if the Chronicles had not been written, we should never have known that Manasseh, repented and found the Lord when he was old. He was only twelve years old when he became king, and from that day he cast off the fear of the Lord, served graven images, and built altars for all the host of heaven, and did wickedly, “above all that the Amorites did.” For years this went on, until the Lord had mercy upon him and sent him, bound in great affliction, to Babylon, where he sought the Lord God of his fathers, and prayed unto Him, and found Him; and then it says, “Then Manasseh knew that the Lord he was God.” After this poor old Manasseh tried to remedy the evil he had wrought.
Doubtless he spoke to, and wrestled in prayer for, his son Amon, who would not listen or turn to God; but I cannot help thinking that the little child Josiah learned to know and love God by old Manasseh’s teaching. Josiah was only six years old when his grandfather died, and how sweet it is to think how the wee child, the little boy, was laid on his grandfather’s heart to train for God. We read Amon only reigned two years, and then little eight-year-old Josiah came to the throne and did that which was right in the sight of the Lord.
And so dear old friends, copy Manasseh and seek to win the little grandchildren for Jesus, even if you cannot influence their parents it is never too late to mend, and when once you know the Lord, tell others, just as the poor healed demoniac went his way and published before the whole city what great things Jesus had done for him (Luke 8:26-4026And they arrived at the country of the Gadarenes, which is over against Galilee. 27And when he went forth to land, there met him out of the city a certain man, which had devils long time, and ware no clothes, neither abode in any house, but in the tombs. 28When he saw Jesus, he cried out, and fell down before him, and with a loud voice said, What have I to do with thee, Jesus, thou Son of God most high? I beseech thee, torment me not. 29(For he had commanded the unclean spirit to come out of the man. For oftentimes it had caught him: and he was kept bound with chains and in fetters; and he brake the bands, and was driven of the devil into the wilderness.) 30And Jesus asked him, saying, What is thy name? And he said, Legion: because many devils were entered into him. 31And they besought him that he would not command them to go out into the deep. 32And there was there an herd of many swine feeding on the mountain: and they besought him that he would suffer them to enter into them. And he suffered them. 33Then went the devils out of the man, and entered into the swine: and the herd ran violently down a steep place into the lake, and were choked. 34When they that fed them saw what was done, they fled, and went and told it in the city and in the country. 35Then they went out to see what was done; and came to Jesus, and found the man, out of whom the devils were departed, sitting at the feet of Jesus, clothed, and in his right mind: and they were afraid. 36They also which saw it told them by what means he that was possessed of the devils was healed. 37Then the whole multitude of the country of the Gadarenes round about besought him to depart from them; for they were taken with great fear: and he went up into the ship, and returned back again. 38Now the man out of whom the devils were departed besought him that he might be with him: but Jesus sent him away, saying, 39Return to thine own house, and show how great things God hath done unto thee. And he went his way, and published throughout the whole city how great things Jesus had done unto him. 40And it came to pass, that, when Jesus was returned, the people gladly received him: for they were all waiting for him. (Luke 8:26‑40)). If you only get one little child to love Jesus it may be the means of leading a great multitude to serve the Lord, as in the case of the child Josiah, for it says in 2 Chronicles 35:18,18And there was no passover like to that kept in Israel from the days of Samuel the prophet; neither did all the kings of Israel keep such a passover as Josiah kept, and the priests, and the Levites, and all Judah and Israel that were present, and the inhabitants of Jerusalem. (2 Chronicles 35:18) “There was no Passover like to that kept since the days of Samuel.”
Emily P. Leakey.