IT WAS IN the village of Oakley and I was going from house to house with tracts and books, and inviting the people to some gospel meetings that I was having there. Knocking at a cottage door, I heard a voice say, “Come in!”
“How do you know that I am not Satan that you are inviting into your house?” I called out.
“I don’t think it’s he,” came the reply, “for he is so ill-behaved that he walks in without knocking; and if it be he, let him come in, and I will talk to him about a Name. That will soon make him run. He doesn’t like,
“Jesus, the name high over all,
In earth and sea and sky;
Angels and men before Him fall,
And devils fear and fly.”
I walked in and there was an old man, 89 years old, and his sharp little wife, aged 86, sitting in front of the fire having supper.
“You’re just in time, sir, to join us. It’s a great day here with us. We are celebrating our 65th wedding anniversary.”
They were having tea without milk or sugar, and bread without any butter. Their small allowance would not allow it. Nevertheless they were very cheerful.
I begged them to wait a few mites till I got back from the store, where I bought some tea, sugar, milk and butter, and also a cake. The old lady was wonderfully lively, but old Mr. Hawes was almost blind, lame, and helpless. I asked a favor of presenting each with a piece of silver on their 65th wedding anniversary, and with a scripture that was on my mind. I read to them from the 28th of Genesis, pointing out chiefly verse 12: “And he dreamed, and behold a ladder set up on the earth, and the top of it reached to heaven: and behold the angels of God ascending and descending on it. And, behold, the Lord stood above it.”
“Why, that’s my scripture!” the old man exclaimed. “The Lord gave me that 24 years ago, when I was ‘born again.’ I went to town in harvest time, one Sunday, and there was a man by the name of John Jones preaching out on the grass. We laid down and listened to him, and he took that ‘dream’ and ‘ladder’ for his text. He said that ‘dream’ was made up of six different parts:
1. ‘Heaven,’ the top of the ladder.
2. Then ‘earth’ at the bottom of it.
3. The ‘ladder’ in between, reaching from earth to heaven.
4. ‘God’ at the top of it, at His mansion door, looking down upon the sleeping guilty sinner.
5. The ‘dreaming sinner’ at the bottom, and
6. The ‘angels of God’ ascending and descending.”
“He then asked us which of the six parts we liked best. He chose the `ladder,’ so did I; and I see’d myself to be the sleeping guilty sinner at the bottom of it, as I lay down on the grass. He then showed us Jesus Christ in front of the ladder with a crown of thorns upon His head, and His black back bleeding with the cruel scourge, and nails through His feet and hands, and His side wound with the soldier’s spear, out of which flowed His blood for us sleeping and guilty sinners, saying unto us, ‘I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by Me’ (John 14:66Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me. (John 14:6)).
“The Spirit showed me that Job’s ‘dream’ was fulfilled in Jesus, and that He is the only true ‘ladder’ to heaven and to God. And so, looking unto Jesus, I got converted that Sunday evening there, lying on the grass, looking up the ‘ladder.’
“I could see the way to heaven quite plain. The preacher said, ‘If a mad bull was after us, wouldn’t we run up the ‘ladder’ out of his reach?’ Then he said, ‘There was a mad angel after us, and that our adversary, the devil, as a roaring lion went about seeking whom he might devour (1 Peter 5:88Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour: (1 Peter 5:8)), there was no safety for us but on the ‘ladder,’ and that it didn’t do to dance about it at the bottom of it, or to wait until another night, but to get on it at once.’
“The Spirit of God helped me to put my guilty feet on that ‘ladder’ that night, and I have been on it ever since. It seems that I am at the top of it now, and can almost see the gates sometimes, and the angels, and the Lord standing there, waiting to welcome me home.”
I then told those dear old folks that I was John Jones who preached about the dream that night.
“Now I know why the Spirit moved within me when I first heard your voice at the door,” said the old man. “Thank God for sending you to us, that I may see you before I go home.” He then wept and rejoiced, and we sang:
“To our bountiful Father above,
We will offer the tribute of praise,
For the glorious gift of His love,
And the blessings that hallow our days.
In the sweet bye and bye
We shall meet on that beautiful shore.
Dear old man, before the next anniversary of his wedding day he was “at home with the Lord.”
ML-12/05/1971