Sudden Conversions

 •  4 min. read  •  grade level: 6
 
I had been holding a series of gospel meetings in a tent pitched in a little country town. Among those who came from time to time to listen to the sweet and gracious message of God's salvation were a gentleman and his two daughters.
Each meeting they attended seemed to leave a deeper and deeper impression. It was more than interesting to observe their curiosity give place to interest, interest deepen into exercise, and exercise into real soul-anxiety. The three tried, at first, to disguise the inward struggle; but at last it was openly confessed, and I was invited to pay them a visit.
During the visit the father sat with heaving breast and tearful eyes listening to the message of peace. The mother busied herself with her needlework, apparently in utter indifference to the whole thing.
Presently a half-suppressed sob bursting from her husband roused her. She at once turned to me and began to apologize for her husband's "emotional weakness." Then, turning angrily upon him, she chided him for his want of manliness. "Don't make a fool of yourself," she demanded of him.
Next, she took up the conversation, trying to turn it from its very personal character into a merely religious discussion. She began with the remark: "I don't believe in sudden conversions."
"Oh! You don't believe in sudden conversion, Mrs. Wilson?" I answered.
"No; I don't indeed," was her heated reply.
"Well, Mrs. Wilson, I have not the slightest hesitation in saying the devil does! Furthermore, I believe, he is very anxious at this moment that neither you nor your husband should have one.
"Besides, there is not a shadow of doubt that God believes in sudden conversions. Did you ever read the story of the dying thief on Calvary? It is recorded of him that in the MORNING he reviled the Savior; at NOON he confessed Him as Lord; and at NIGHT he was with Christ in Paradise. That was quick work, wasn't it?
"Then we read in Acts 16:19-40 of the jailer in Philippi. One day there were put into his custody two of the Lord's servants. Scripture is careful to tell us they received at his hands the most merciless treatment. He then retired to rest with a conscience as easy as his heart was hard.
"Giving an account of his conversion, Scripture says, 'Suddenly there was a great earthquake, so that the foundations of the prison were shaken.' It woke the jailer up from his natural slumber. It likewise woke him up from his soul-slumber, producing in him a moral earthquake.
" 'Suddenly' his eyes were opened, and he found that he stood face to face with a lost eternity.
" 'Suddenly' the desperate need of his soul was plain before him. No laggard footsteps now—no time for delay. With light in hand he 'sprang in, and came trembling, and fell down before Paul and Silas.' On the very verge of desperation, he cried, 'Sirs, what must I do to be saved?'
"Never was physician's cordial more readily at hand nor more eagerly appropriated than that short peace-speaking gospel message: 'Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved.' Acts 16:31.
"Observe, Scripture is careful to mention that 'he took them THE SAME HOUR of the night—washed their stripes-and was baptized... STRAIGHTWAY—believing in God all his house.' Genuine work and speedily accomplished, eh?
"Let me give you one more testimony, Mrs. Wilson. Saul of Tarsus; an eminently religious man, and yet a hater of Christ and the mad persecutor of the saints of God, was on his way to Damascus to prosecute his plans for stamping out the name of Christ.
"Giving an account of his own conversion in Acts 22, he says, 'Suddenly there shone from heaven a great light round about me.'
" 'Suddenly' upon the ears of the persecutor there rang a voice from heaven.
" 'Suddenly' there streamed into his dark heart a light from heaven; and he, too, cried out, 'What shall I do?'
"Three days after this you will read he was full of the Holy Ghost, and 'straightway' preaching Christ in the synagogue that He is the Son of God. Acts 9:20. Pretty sharp work that, Mrs. Wilson, wasn't it? Too sharp altogether for the devil, that arch-enemy of his soul and yours."
"Well," replied Mrs. Wilson, "I don't think it can be jumped into all at once like that. It requires thinking over."
Many in this world confess to having thought about it for years, as Mrs. Wilson had. She certainly could not be charged with 'jumping into it all at once.' It is true she had thought about it, but she had stopped at thinking.
Friend, thinking about salvation cannot save you. God offers it to you now, saying: "Now, is the accepted time; behold, now is the day of salvation." 2 Cor. 6: 2.
If men and women only knew their awful danger they would be in earnest to be saved on the spot.
Reader, there is no halfway ground. At this moment you are either saved or lost, SAVED OR LOST! Which?