At last the pain was not to be borne. He would face it and conquer it. But he went to confession in vain to get the peace he longed for, and which can only be found by faith in Christ alone. A liberal discount on his picture gave ease of mind for a week or two. But then up rose the old question, “You must love Him very much, do you not?” and would be answered. He grew restless, and could not settle to his work. So wandering about, he heard of things which had not come under his notice before. One day he saw a group of persons hastening to a house near the walls, a poor place, and then he noticed others coming in the opposite direction, and they, too, passed into its low doorway. He asked what was happening there, but the man he questioned either would not or could not satisfy him. This roused his curiosity. A few days later he learned that a stranger, one of the “Reformed,” lived there—one of those despised men who appealed on every occasion to the word of God. It was hardly respectable, hardly safe, even to know them. Yet perhaps here he might find that which he sought. The artist had heard how these Reformers risked and frequently parted with their all, for the truth they held. They might possess the secret of peace. So Stenburg went to observe, perhaps to inquire, certainly not to join them; but a man cannot approach fire and remain cold. He saw a man who might have lived in ease, enduring hardship; one who might have been honored, despised; who might have been beloved and respected, an outcast; and yet serene, even happy.
This Reformed preacher spoke and looked as one who was walking the earth with Christ; yes, one to whom He was all. Stenburg found what he longed for —a living faith. His new friend lent him for a time a precious copy of the New Testament, but hunted from Dusseldorf after a few weeks he left, and had to take the book with him; but its essence was left in Stenburg’s heart.
Ah! no need to question now. He felt in his soul the fire of an ardent love. “Did all that for me! How can I ever tell men of that love, that boundless love, which can brighten their lives, as it has mine? It is for them too, but they do not see it, as I did not. How can I preach it? I cannot speak. I am a man of few words. If I were to try, I could never speak it out. It burns in my heart but I cannot express it — the love of Christ!” So thinking, the artist idly drew with a piece of charcoal in his fingers a rough sketch of a thorn-crowned head. His eyes grew moist as he did so. Suddenly the thought flashed through his soul, “I can paint! My brush must proclaim it. Ah! in that picture His face was all agony. But that was not the truth. Love unutterable, infinite compassion, willing sacrifice!”
The artist fell on his knees, and prayed to paint worthily, and thus speak.
And then he wrought. The fire of genius blazed up—up to the highest fiber of his power; nay, beyond it. The picture of the crucifixion was a wonder—almost Divine.
He would not sell it. He gave it a freewill offering to his native city. It was hung in the public gallery, and there the citizens flocked to see it, and voices were hushed and hearts melted as they stood before it, and the burghers returned to their homes knowing the love of God, and repeating to themselves the words written so distinctly beneath—
“All this I did for thee;
What hast thou done for Me?”
Stenburg also used to go there, and, watching far back from the corner in the gallery the people’ who gathered about the picture, he prayed God to bless his painted sermon. One day he observed, when the rest of the visitors had left, a poor girl standing weeping bitterly before it. The artist approached her. “What grieves thee, child?” he asked.
The girl turned; she was Pepita. “O! Signor, if He had but loved me so,” she said, pointing to the face of yearning love, bending above them. “I am only a poor gipsy. For you is the love, but not for such as I;” and her despairing tears fell unrestrained.
“Pepita, it was also for thee.” And then the artist told her all. Until the late hour at which the gallery closed they sat and talked. The painter did not weary now of answering her questions, for the subject was the one he loved best. He told the girl the story of that wondrous life, magnificent death, and crowning glory of resurrection, and also explained to her the union that redeeming love effected. She listened, received, and believed. “All this I did for thee.”
Two years have passed since the picture had been ordered. Winter had come again. The cold was intense, and the wind moaned down the narrow streets of Dusseldorf, and shook the casements of the artist’s dwelling. His day’s work was done, and by the blazing pine logs he was seated, reading a copy he had with difficulty obtained of his beloved Gospel. A knock sounded at the door, and a man was admitted. He wore an old sheepskin jacket, on which the snow had frozen; his hair hung in dark locks about his face. He glanced ravenously toward the bread and meat upon the table, even as he gave his message.
“Would the gentleman come with him on urgent business?”
“Where?” said the painter.
That he must not tell, or the agents of the law might get to know, and drive them out. It had often so happened before.
“Wherefore do you wish me to come?”
“I cannot say,” replied the man;” but one who is dying wants to see you.”
“Eat,” said the artist. “I will accompany you.” The man murmured his thanks as he devoured the food.
“You are hungry?”
“Sire, we all are famished with hunger.”
Stenburg brought a bag of provisions. “Can you carry this?”
“Ah! gladly, gladly. But come, there is no time to lose.”
The artist followed. His guide led him quickly through the streets, and out into the country beyond. The moon rose, and showed they were nearing the forest. They passed into it. The branches were laden with snow, and the great crowded trunks confusing. No path, but the man never hesitated. He silently and swiftly kept ahead of Stenburg. At last they came to a glade belted round with trees. Here a few tents were erected.
“Go in there,” said the man, pointing to one of the tents, and then turned to a group of men, women, and children who thronged about him. He spoke to them in a wild tongue, and lifted his bag from his shoulder.
The artist, crouching, crept into the tent. A brilliant ray of moonlight illuminated the poor interior. On a mass of dried leaves was the form of a young woman. Her face was pinched and hollow. “Why Pepita!”
At the sound of the artist’s voice the eyes opened. Those wonderful dark eyes still were brilliant. A smile trembled to her lips awl she raised herself on her elbow.
“Yes,” she said, “HE has come for me! He holds out His hands! “For thee.” “All this I did for thee.” And she bade him farewell.
Long years after both the painter and the gipsy girl had met in another land, a gay young nobleman drove in his splendid equipage into Dusseldorf, and while his horses were baited, wandered into that famous gallery. He was rich, young, intelligent, —the world bright, and its treasures within his grasp. He stood before Stenburg’s picture arrested. He read and re-read the legend on the frame. He could not tear himself away, —it grew into his heart. The love of Christ laid its powerful grasp on his soul. Hours passed; the light faded; the curator touched the weeping nobleman, and told him it was time to close the gallery. Night had come, —nay! rather for that young man, the dawn of eternal Life. He was Zinzendorf. He returned to the inn and re-entered his carriage, but to turn his back on Paris, and seek again his home. From that moment he threw. life, fortune, fame, at the feet of Him who had whispered to his heart, —
“All this I did for thee;
What hast thou done for Me?”
Zinzendorf, the father of the Moravian Missions, answered that question by his devoted life and his welcomed death.
Stenburg’s picture no longer hangs in the gallery of Dusseldorf, for when some years ago the gallery was destroyed by fire, it perished, but it preached, and God used it to tell of His gift—Calvary’s Substitute—of whom Paul said, “He loved me and gave Himself for me.”
Can you say “and for me?”
“I gave My life for thee; My precious blood I shed,
That thou might’st ransomed be, and quickened from the dead.
I gave My life for thee: what hast thou given for Me?
“I spent long years for thee, in weariness and woe,
That an eternity of joy thou mightest know.
I spent long years for thee: hast thou spent one for Me?
“My Father’s home of light, My rain bow-circled throne,
I left, for earthly night, for wanderings sad and lone.
I left it all for thee: hast thou left aught for me?
“I suffered much for thee—more than thy tongue can tell
Of bitterest agony,—to rescue thee from hell.
I suffered much for thee: what canst thou bear for Me?
“And I have brought to thee, down from My home above,
Salvation full and free, My pardon and My love.
Great gifts I brought to thee: what hast thou brought to Me?”
Oh! let thy life be given, thy years for Him be spent,
World-fetters all be riven, and joy with suffering blent.
Bring thou thy worthless all: follow thy Saviour’s call!
ML 09/30/1906