“Does your brother ever speak a word for Jesus when he is at home on his vacation holidays?”
There was manifest uneasiness before the answer came, and when it did come, it was with anything but good grace from a minister’s daughter.
“My brother is a gentleman, Mr. S— , he does not believe in these street preachings, which are now so common. If common people are supposed to be able to preach, what is the use of spending years at the University?”
The above remarks brought rather abruptly to a close, a conversation which had been going on in the country manse where the minister’s accomplished daughter, who kept house for her widowed father, entertained on a Saturday night, the preacher who was to fill her father’s pulpit the following day, while he was absent at “The General Assembly.”
Her brother—an only son, and much thought of—was a student in the University. Whether the stranger assumed that he was “born again,” and therefore engaged in winning others to Christ during his holidays, as many Christians happily are; or whether the question was meant to bring out the spiritual whereabouts of the minister’s daughter, I know not, but if the latter, it did not fail in its object. She was clearly shocked at the idea of her brother being a street preacher, which she assumed was what the visitor meant by “speaking a word for Jesus,” and assured him in an air of conscious dignity, that none of their family had ever condescended to anything so mean as “revival” preaching.
Little more was said that night, but on the morrow, the earnest preacher feeling he was in a “valley of dry bones,” rang out the gospel message in no uncertain sound, and even “spoke a word for Jesus” at the corner after the evening service.
As he was preparing to return by the morning train to his home, the minister’s daughter entered the room, flushed and excited, carrying a letter from her brother which had come in by the morning mail, in her hand.
“This is from Jack,” she said, “but I cannot make him out. He says some one has been holding services for students, and he has been converted.”
“Praise the Lord for that,” said the stranger.
“And that isn’t the worst of it,” continued the excited girl, “he is coming here next Sunday, with several students, to preach on the street. I must write at once to my father, and get him to stop the whole thing.”
“That may not be so easily done, Miss L— ,” said the stranger, who now stood bag in hand ready to depart, “for when the love of Christ gets into one’s heart in full tide, it carries all before it like Niagara. Give your brother my kindest regards, and say, I shall pray that he and his companions may have a royal day next Sunday, and many souls for Jesus.”
Early on Saturday afternoon, Jack appeared; the same ruddy youth, full of life and vigor as before, but with a new luster in his eye. Kissing his sister as he stepped across the threshold, he said aloud,
“Hallelujah! what a Saviour.”
Jack knew well he was in for a battle, but was determined to have the honor of being first in the field. At tea, he told the whole story of his conversion, how he had kicked against the truth, fought against his convictions, how pride kept him from owning himself a sinner in need of a Saviour, and how at last every prop gave way, and he cast himself upon Christ, and was saved.
“And now Nellie,” said the happy young believer, “you get me some paste and a brush, and I will bill the village for tomorrow’s meeting; I came early on purpose.”
This was too much for his sister’s dignity; she refused. But Jack soon got the necessaries for himself, and in half-an-hour appeared with bills, paste and brush, ready for the road. Nellie knew it was no use opposing or objecting, so she simply said,
“I wonder you’re not ashamed.”
“Not ashamed to do anything for Jesus, Nell, He has done much for me,” said the happy student, and in a moment he was off.
The morrow came: a memorable day too it was, which many of the villagers will have good cause to remember, for many of them heard the gospel in its simplicity and clearness for the first time that day. God saved sinners, and among the first to fall by the edge of the sword of the Spirit, and to be born of God, was Nellie, the minister’s daughter. She was a very different Nellie then, and learned to bear reproach for Jesus’ sake.
Reader, has your pride of heart been humbled, and have you as a lost and guilty sinner been saved to serve the Lord Jesus? If so, you will know it, and you will not be ashamed to do anything for Jesus now.
“Whosoever therefore shall confess Me before men, him will I confess also before My Father which is in heaven. But whosoever shall deny Me before men, him will I also deny before My Father which is in heaven” (Matt. 10:32-33).