It was New Year’s Day when the drums and flutes began to play. Now, three days later, the drums continued to boom out their rhythms and the flutes kept on playing their short, shrill tunes over and over. Men and women from a town high in the Andes Mountains had been dancing up and down the streets for all three days. They were so tired that they could hardly keep on dancing, but they did not stop. Fear kept them dancing until the end of the third day. Sadly, they thought that the drums, the flutes and the dancing would drive away the evil spirits of the New Year. Most of the dancers had never heard of the wonderful love of God who forgives sinners if they receive the Lord Jesus as their Savior. They did not know that God protects His children and that Jesus is stronger than
evil spirits.
As they passed by the house many times with the same short, shrill tune and the continual beating of the drums, I wondered if perhaps the evil spirits had come closer to the poor dancers instead of
going away.
“I used to dance in the streets like that,” said Leona.
Leona? Dancing in the streets? It hardly seemed possible. Why, I had seen Leona giving out gospel papers in the streets, not dancing. She often came to ask if I had more of the papers. “I don’t know how to read,” she said, “but I know they tell about my Savior.” Another time when Leona visited us, she said, “It hurts to see the gospel papers thrown on the ground. Some do not want them.”
Yes, Leona was different now from the dancers in the street. She had lived most of her life chewing coca leaves, dancing with the others, and living without any thought of God. If you had seen her only about two years before, you probably would have thought that the old lady, wrinkled and bent over with age, had lived without God for too many years. How could she be saved now? But a loving, patient God knew that it was not too late. He sent a Christian to tell Leona about the Savior, the Lord Jesus who died on the cross and shed His blood to save sinners. She received the “Lord Jesus Christ, who gave Himself for our sins, that He might deliver us from this present evil world”
(Galatians 1:3-43Grace be to you and peace from God the Father, and from our Lord Jesus Christ, 4Who gave himself for our sins, that he might deliver us from this present evil world, according to the will of God and our Father: (Galatians 1:3‑4)).
Now Leona was saved from her sins. Although she was the oldest person at our Bible meetings, she was usually the first to arrive. How God had changed her life after so many years
without Him!
“How old are you, sister Leona?” I asked.
Leona chuckled. “How old would I be?” she replied. “My parents told me when I was 16, but that was too many years ago. I can’t remember now.”
Another day I went to visit Leona in her home. It was a small hut made out of mud bricks. There was no window, just a door. She lived with her son and his seven children, and they were so poor that the children sometimes ate cornstalks.
“How are you getting along, sister Leona?” I asked.
“We’re okay, but the vinchucas won’t let us sleep,” she said. Vinchucas are bugs that hide in the thatched roofs and come out at night to bite those who are sleeping. Leona’s hut was so dark that they would come out even during the day if it was a cloudy day.
One day we had to leave Leona’s town in the mountains. We were sorry to leave our friends there. One of the last things Leona said to us was, “My heart bothers me, but I have only one Doctor — He’s in heaven! I have only one Savior — in heaven!”
After that, we learned that Leona also left that town in the mountains. She left her mud hut to go to live in paradise! She left this world to go to be forever with her Savior. She was poor in this world, but now she is rich in heaven.
How about you? If you were to die right now, would you be rich forever in heaven, or poor forever in hell? God wants to welcome you to His happy home in heaven, but there is one thing that can never enter heaven — sin can never enter there. Leona had many sins to be washed away, but by the blood of Christ she was cleansed from all of them in God’s sight. “The blood of Jesus Christ His Son [cleanses] us from all sin” (1 John 1:77But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin. (1 John 1:7)).
Won’t you come to the Lord Jesus for salvation like Leona did? If you do, God will welcome you someday into His home, not just as a visitor, but as one of His very own children. “In My Father’s house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto Myself; that where I am, there ye may be also” (John 14:2-32In my Father's house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. 3And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also. (John 14:2‑3)).
Messages of God’s Love 7/20/2025