One morning a young dressmaker hurried along towards the post office where she expected to find a letter awaiting her. It was not a business letter, nor was it an epistle on urgent family matters. It was a letter in which she expected to find something that would give rest to her troubled soul.
The poor girl looked pale and haggard as she walked briskly on. She had spent many sleepless nights lately.
Her mind was troubled about thoughts of eternity and of her sure destiny to appear before a righteous God.
A cousin living at a distance had once spoken to her about her soul. She had especially warned her against a profession of religion without a possession of Christ, and had told her that if ever she became troubled about her state before God to write and let her know, as she would be praying for her.
Laughing at the idea, the young dressmaker had replied, "It's not likely you'll get a letter from me for a while, if it has to be about that. I'm quite pleased with myself as I am."
But God has His own way of speaking to sinners and making them think of eternal things. During the past week the seamstress was shocked by the sudden death of a young and beautiful girl for whom she was making a wedding gown. God used this incident to arouse her to a sense of her own lack of preparation for eternity.
Her soul became troubled. Her sins, though not of the kind that friends and neighbors could see, became quite glaring to her and a burden upon her conscience. Hell, her just punishment, was real to her now, as it is to every awakened soul.
Now she remembered her cousin. She wrote to her, telling her the state she was in, and asking her what to do to get peace. She was sure an answer would come, so hurried along to get the letter that morning. When it was handed to her at the post office window, so eager was she to get to its contents that, bursting open the envelope, she read her cousin's letter while standing at the office counter. Afterwards she confessed when telling the story of her conversion: "I was saved right there in the post office by simply believing on the Lord Jesus Christ."
That letter was full of gospel grace. It told how Christ had finished the work of redemption on Calvary; that there was nothing to do but simply and only to believe on Him, to trust in Him, and to rest on His Word for assurance of salvation. The letter ended with a little poem:
"Nothing, either great or small,
Nothing, sinner, no;
Jesus did it, did it all
Long, long ago.
“‘It is finished!' Yes, indeed,
Finished every jot;
Sinner, this is all you need;
Tell me, is it not?"
"That's all; that is all. Yes, yes, I see it. I know it now," said the dressmaker half aloud. The astonished postmistress wondered what it was all about. Oblivious to glances, the young seamstress was seeing herself as she was in God's view. She let go all in which she boasted, all she was naturally proud of, all her own righteousness, and came as a lost and guilty sinner to Christ. She cast herself on Him and, true to His Word, He saved her. For He says, "Him that cometh to Me I will in no wise cast out." John 6:3737All that the Father giveth me shall come to me; and him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out. (John 6:37).
And thus, only thus, will He save you, my reader. There is no other Savior—there is no other way.