It happened outside a book store I where Mr. Carr, the Christian owner had placed an assortment of Bibles for sale in the window.
A troupe of young fellows, who called themselves Ethiopian Serenaders, with blackened faces and hands and dressed in very strange costumes, had arranged themselves for one of their performances. They sang some comic songs and some plaintive melodies, accompanied by some amusing acts and gestures. Then one in the group, a tall, interesting young fellow, who had the air of one who was beneath his proper station in life, stepped up to the door, tambourine in hand, and asked for a few pennies from people going in and out.
Here it was that Mr. Carr took one of the Bibles out of the window and addressed the youth: “See here, young man,” he said, “I will give you a shilling, and this Book besides, if you will read a portion of it among your comrades there, and in the hearing of the bystanders.”
“Here is a shilling for an easy job,” chuckled the young fellow to his mates. “I am going to give a ‘public reading!’” Mr. Carr opened the Bible at the fifteenth chapter of Luke, and pointing to verse eleven, he requested the young man to begin reading at that point.
“Now, Jim, speak up,” said another of the party, “and earn your shilling like a man.”
Jim took the Book and read: “And he said, A certain man had two sons: and the younger of them said to his father, Father, give me the portion of goods that falleth to me. And he divided unto them his living.”
There was something in the voice of the reader, as well as in the strangeness of the circumstances, that caused a silence to fall on everyone. At the same time, an air of seriousness took possession of the youth, and still further commanded the rapt attention of the crowd.
He read on: “And not many days after the younger son gathered all together, and took his journey into a far country, and there wasted his substance with riotous living.”
“That’s you, Jim!” exclaimed one of his friends. “It’s just like what you told me of yourself and your father!”
The reader continued: “And when he had spent all, there arose a mighty famine in that land; and he began to be in want.”
“Why, that’s you again, Jim!” said the voice. “Go on!”
“And he went and joined himself to a citizen of that country; and he sent him into his fields to feed swine. And he would fain have filled his belly with the husks that the swine did eat: and no man gave unto him.”
“That’s like us all!” said the voice, once more interrupting. “We are all beggars, and might be better than we are! Go on: Let’s hear what came of it.”
The young man read on, and as he read his voice trembled; “And when he came to himself, he said, How many hired servants of my father’s have bread enough and to spare, and I perish with hunger! I will arise and go to my father.”
At this point he fairly broke down, and could read no more. All were deeply impressed and moved. The whole reality of his past rose up to view before the eyes of the young man, and in the clear story of the gospel a ray of hope dawned upon him for his future. His father—his father’s house—and his mother’s too; and the plenty of love ever bestowed upon him there; and the hired servants, all having enough; and then himself, his father’s son, and his present state, his companionships, his habits, his sins, his poverty, his outcast condition, his questionable means of making a living—all these came climbing like an invading force of thoughts and reflections into the citadel of his mind, and fairly overcame him.
That day—that scene—proved the turning point in the life of the young prodigal. He sought the confidence and the advice of his Christian friend, Mr. Carr, who had thus through providence intervened for his deliverance. Soon they got in touch with his parents, and before long the long-lost dearly loved child returned to the love and shelter of the home he had left years before. And still better, the young prodigal returned to the heavenly Father. He found, as we trust our reader will also find that God is a gracious and forgiving God, that He receives all who come to Him through the work of His beloved Son who died upon the cross for sinners.
ML 03/28/1965