LITTLE Janet Bruce lived in a pretty village in Scotland. Near to her home was a large wood. If you were to go in to it without a guide, you might go on for miles before you could find your way out of it. In some places no path is to be seen, and tall trees and creeping plants cast a deep shadow over the ground.
Janet was the only child of a poor widow, but God who cares for the widow and the fatherless, had raised up many friends for them; so that they had never wanted for anything. One evening, late in the autumn Janet sat at the door of her mother’s cottage. She had been told never to go far away from the house, lest she should be lost.
But on this evening, as she looked over the fields, she saw some bright blue flowers, and as she was very fond of making little bouquets of wild blossoms, she thought she should like to pluck them, and when she had got these, she saw more a little farther off, and forgetting her mother’s words, on she went. Janet did not disobey her mother on purpose, but it brought her into trouble just the same.
Do you remember a verse which says, “How shall we escape if we neglect so great salvation.” Heb. 2:33How shall we escape, if we neglect so great salvation; which at the first began to be spoken by the Lord, and was confirmed unto us by them that heard him; (Hebrews 2:3)? If you are not obeying the word of the Lord, but just forgetting about it day by day, because you are seeking things which please and interest you, are you not disobeying Him, just as Janet disobeyed her mother? All of a sudden the little girl felt a drop of rain, and the cool wind blew through her. She turned quickly round, intending to run home, but alas! she could see no cottage, nothing but trees, and shrubs all around her. She ran backwards and forwards, seeking for a path, each moment getting deeper and deeper into the dark wood. At last wearied and footsore, the terrified child sank upon the ground, and burst into tears. She was lost, and she knew it.
If you are still an unbeliever, you, too, are lost, do you know it? Have you ever said to yourself, I am a lost sinner, nothing that I can do, can take me to Heaven? Well, Janet felt she could do nothing. Over and over again she sobbed, “Oh! why did I disobey my mother? What a naughty girl I am!” Poor little child, are you sorry for her? at last she dropped asleep, there in the cold, wet wood. All night long as she slept, the neighbors were looking for her, but she did not hear their calls, and they did not find her. As soon as the daylight came again, she awoke, and felt very hungry, but there was no nice breakfast for her, and no loving mother to kiss her. She was alone in that great wood. She rose up and walked on; but not so fast as before, for she was cold and stiff, and faint for want of food.
After a time she came to a place where she saw some dark-looking people seated on the outside of a little tent. They were gypsies. Poor Janet felt very frightened, but at last she went up to them and told them she was lost. They told her to sit down by their fire, and gave her some food out of a large iron kettle that hung from three upright sticks.
But did they take her home? Oh, no! they took off her nice frock and gave her a ragged one, and told her she could stay with. them and be their little servant.
The pathway of disobedience is always a hard one. The Lord Jesus told a story when He was down here of a young man who left his home, and went off to please himself, and do you remember how unhappy he became, and how, hungry and friendless, he had to go out and feed somebody’s pigs? And yet in that far country, that young man was learning a lesson which we all need to learn. He was learning that he was a sinner; that he did not deserve anything but punishment. Have you learned that, dear little child? I know you have not run away from home like little Janet, but you have been a disobedient child for all that. You have sinned against God, time and again, and you know it. Yes, you, too, are lost, but the Good Shepherd has not forgotten you, and He is longing to have you in His arms, just as the Father in the parable, was longing for His son, and as little Janet’s mother was longing for her child. Next week I must tell you how she got home again.
(To be continued.)
Messages of God’s Love 9/27/1908