THERE lived a good many years ago in the city of Exeter, in the south of England, a very poor old man, whose home was in a wretched court, in the poorest part of the city. It was a place where you could find, nothing but sin and evil. One wretched, dwelling seemed more desolate and dirty than the next, and it would have been impossible to find a decent home, where drunken quarrels, and wicked words were not heard.
The old man had been a terrible drunkard, he knew very well what it was to be in jail, and often he had neither food nor clothing. One day however while in a drunken state, he met with a severe accident, which nearly cost him his life. When he recovered from this illness, he signed the pledge, and at the time I am telling you of, he had not tasted liquor for twenty years. Do you think old John was ready to go to heaven now, because he had become a sober man? No, he was more fit perhaps to live upon the earth, but no nearer heaven, for the Lord Jesus has Himself told us, that “Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.” John was in some ways a reformed man, but he was not yet a new man.
But God, who is rich in mercy, was looking down in love and pity on this poor old sinner, eighty years old, and still in his sins, and one night he had a strange dream. He dreamed that God promised to give him something, and that he repeated to him this verse “Christ hath once suffered for sins, the Just for the unjust, that He might bring us to God.” No doubt old John had heard these words somewhere before. He may have even learned them as a little child, but be that as it may, he had quite forgotten them, until God brought them again to his memory in this strange dream.
When John woke up, he thought a great deal about his dream, and especially about those wonderful words. He was so afraid he might forget them, he wrote them down upon an old piece of slate he happened to have.
In the course of the day as he was sitting in his little room, still thinking of all this he heard an unusual noise in the court, and opening his window, he put out his head to see what was the matter. There was a man standing, quite different looking than the ragged dirty looking objects who were generally to be seen there. This man was decently dressed, and he held in his hand a book, yes, the book of all books, the Bible. And as he stood there, in that miserable court, he was reading in a loud voice, so that all should hear, the very same words John had dreamed about, “Christ hath once suffered for sins, the Just for the unjust that He might bring us to God.” Old John could keep quiet no longer, and as the words fell upon his ear, he shouted out, “Thank God, I’m saved.” In a few minutes he came downstairs with the piece of slate in his hand, and showed the people who had gathered round, the words written upon it, and told the story of his dream. He kept rubbing his hands for joy and delight, and saying again and again, “Thank God, I’m saved.”
“How do you know you are saved?” asked the young man, who had just been repeating the verse.
“Why, sir, don’t you see? Christ died for me. He suffered, ‘the Just for the unjust, that He might bring us to God.’ I am the unjust one, Jesus was the Just. I must be saved.” John never changed his mind about this; he was always willing to tell the reason for the hope that was in him, and his faith stood firm, for he knew Whom he had believed. In his dying hours he could say, “I am looking up; Christ is there, and I shall be there with Him soon.”
Now dear children if you do not already know this verse, would it not be nice for you to learn it too, not to forget it until you are eighty years old, but to believe it just now. You will find it in 1 Pet. 3:1818For Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh, but quickened by the Spirit: (1 Peter 3:18), “Christ hath once suffered for sins, the Just for the unjust, that He might bring us to God.”
ML 06/02/1912