LITTLE Emily lives with her mother and sister Ellen in a quiet little street of the old city of Norwich. It is rather a poor street, but the houses are neat and respectable, and sometimes in summer the tiny gardens look gay with flowers. Emily’s mother is a dressmaker, and has to work hard with the needle, and Emily will go on errands, and help to keep the house tidy. I am glad to tell you that although young, she is a believer in the Lord Jesus.
Perhaps you may learn a lesson from the trouble that this poor fatherless family was called to pass through during two days, a few months ago. Their street is near the river Wensum, and one Saturday the waters began to rise. About teatime they entered the little back kitchen. Emily with her mother and sister, and the aged grandmother, took refuge upstairs with all the things they could carry with them. The waters rose higher and higher. Poor Ellen thought she and mother would have to die together. All night there was no sleep for them, and in the morning they looked out anxiously for some one to come and save them.
At last they saw some kind men they knew, coming near in boats. Emily and Ellen called from the bedroom window “Oh Mr.—, come and save us!” “I am coming after you,” was the answer. Glad indeed they were when their deliverers helped them into the boats, and saved them from a watery grave. One of the kind helpers nearly lost his life in the effort.
How earnestly Emily and Ellen watched from the window, and how eagerly did they accept the deliverance their heavenly Father provided for them. They all four love Jesus, and during that dark and sorrowful night, the widowed mother remembered the words, “Put your trust in God,” and her soul was sweetly sustained and comforted.
What would you have thought of Emily and Ellen, if, instead of watching at the window, when their deliverers were drawing nigh, they had hidden themselves in a corner of their room? Would not that have been very foolish? Surely then the men would have said, “Either these persons are rescued, or they do not wish to be saved.” We can scarcely imagine anyone would have been so unwise.
Dear children, if you are unsaved, remember—
“Another flood is coming soon,
Of fiery wrath and woe,
On all whose hearts have here refused
The God of grace to know.
“But Jesus is the living Ark,
Where all who will may come,
And find in Him a hiding-place—
A safe, a happy home.”
A Deliverer has drawn nigh, the blessed Saviour who invites you to come unto Him.
M. E. T.