Visiting one day in a row of cottages, I met a little girl and asked her if she went to any Sunday school.
“No,” she said, shaking her head, “father won’t let me; he says I can go when I am big, but it’s no use a little girl like me going; I wouldn’t know what was said.”
“O yes,” I said, “you would easily understand. We have lots of little girls younger than you, who come every Sunday. They have learned that Jesus died for them, and some of them are saved and very happy. Is your mother in the house?”
“No, Mam,” said the dear child holng down her head, “my mother’s dead, and father and I live together here. He is out working all day, and comes home at six o’clock; if you come after six, you will see him.”
My heart was drawn toward the child, arid I longed that she might hear of Jesus and His love. I called in the evening and found her father there, a rough, careless man. Still he had a fond regard for Sally, and at once consented that she should go to Sunday school the following week. Sally was there tidily dressed, and listened most attentively to what her teacher said. She took a hymn book home with her, and some nice “picture leaflets” with gospel stories.
All through the week Sally kept singing away to herself—
“Have you any room for Jesus?” and the next Lord’s-day she was able to sing the whole hymn very nicely. It was a favorite with her father, and he began to hum it to himself. God used the simple words to show him that he was a sinner, without Christ, and without hope. Nor was this all. When Sally came home from the school the second Lord’s-day, she could say,
“Jesus is mine.” She had “let Him enter” into her heart, and now she was saved and happy. Her father sat in the house that night listening to Sally sing her hymn, as she called it, and the words—
“Soon thy heart be cold and silent, And the Saviour’s pleadings cease,” laid hold upon his soul. For long he was deeply anxious; then he opened and let Jesus “enter” too. Sally and her father are now followers of the Lord, and often while all alone by the cottage fireside, do they join in singing “Sally’s Hymn.”
Have you opened your heart and let Jesus in, or are you still rejecting Him?
The day will come when Jesus will knock no more.
“After this the judgment.”
Reader, this is the Gospel; this is God’s day of salvation. Have you received it?
ML 07/18/1943