HOW it rains! I think I will not go out with my tracts this afternoon,” said a gentleman to himself on a wet Sunday. Then retiring from the window, threw his bundle of tracts on the table, and, yawning, dropped into his easy chair.
There he sat idly musing while the hours fled. By and by his little daughter came in from Sunday-school. Seeing his bundle of tracts on the table, she said;
“Why, papa, haven’t you been out with your tracts?”
“No, my dear.”
“Are you going with them, papa?”
“Not today, my dear, it is so very wet.”
“O, papa, let me go with them. I’ve got my hat on, and can take them around.”
“No, no! It is too wet for anyone to go out. We must stay at home, my dear.”
“I won’t get wet, papa. I’ll take the big umbrella. The people will want the tracts. Do, please, let me go, papa.”
These and similar pleas conquered the father. The little girl started. She knew the district, and was soon at her blessed work. A few steps led her to a large house where she knocked again and again, but no one answered. The poor child’s patience was almost exhausted, when she heard a sound in the house. Another knock, and the door was opened by a woman who wore a good dress, but whose face, the little girl thought, looked very unhappy.
The child smiled upon her, gave her a tract, finished her round, and went home, little thinking that by her walk in the rain that afternoon, she had snatched a soul from the mouth of hell, a body from the jaws of the grave.
Yet it was even so; for the poor woman, at whose door she had waited so long, was in so much trouble and sorrow, that she had planned to take her own life, and she thought she would then be at an end of all her troubles, but, dear children, the Bible says that judgment comes after death. She had not thought that after she would end her life, she would have to meet God about all her sins, and would have a long eternity of sorrow and remorse, and of being shut out from the presence of God forever.
While she was about to carry out her wicked plans, the little girl knocked, and after waiting for some time, she knocked again and again. The knocking disturbed the sad woman inside the house, so after waiting quite a while, she went to the door to find out who was there.
The loving look of the child won her, and turned her from her evil purpose. She took the tract, sat down and read it. and was convicted of her sins before God, and she was led to Christ. She saw that He had died for her, and was saying to her, “Come unto Me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.”
She accepted Him as her own loving Saviour, found in Him rest for her soul, and rejoiced in His salvation.
The next Sunday she told her joyful story to the little girl’s father. Thus was this dear child used of God for the salvation of this sad woman, through the little tract that she handed to her.
Dear children, we, who know the Lord Jesus as our own precious Saviour, can also hand out the little tracts, telling of His wonderful love to the lost and perishing ones, asking Him to bless them to their souls’ salvation.
“In the morning sow thy seed, and in the evening withhold not thine hand: for thou knowest not whether shall prosper, either this or that, or whether they both shall be alike good.” Eccles. 11:6.
ML 04/13/1924