MANY years ago a Christian girl left her native land and loving friends, to go with her husband to Australia. There many trials awaited her—losses were experienced, and much hardship endured. At length Marian's husband took the management of a sheep-farm, far up the country.
It was a lonely place; the only other dwelling in sight was a little black hut perched high up on a neighboring hill. Its inhabitants were a man, notorious for his wickedness, a drunkard and swearer, and his poor ill-used wife.
One day, while walking on the hillside, Marian heard a woman's voice from the hut, singing—
“I do believe, I will believe,
That Jesus died for me;
That on the cross He shed His blood,
From sin to set me free.”
Her emotion may be better imagined than described. Here in the wilderness, with none to whom she could speak of Jesus her Saviour, these sounds from that poor hut seemed to her like heavenly music. She determined to lose no time in seeking out the singer, and found it was the drunkard's poor wife, who, in her husband's absence, was thus lifting up her heart and voice to Him whom she had found a very present help in trouble. How great was the joy of each to find in the other a sister in the Lord; how deep the thankfulness of each heart that the Lord had thus brought them together. From that time they frequently met and found comfort and consolation in speaking together of Him whom each had found to be the "Chiefest among ten thousand, the altogether lovely One.”
Months passed by, bringing little change in either home, when news came that a preacher was about to hold a meeting in a house at some considerable distance. Marian's health prevented her from going, but the poor woman of the hut felt a great longing to attend it. Yet how could she get her husband to consent? Earnestly and often she prayed to her Heavenly Father about it, and He heard her prayer, though He saw fit first to try her faith.
On the evening before that fixed for the preaching, she summoned all her courage and asked her husband to let her attend it. Her request was met by a storm of abuse, and with fearful oaths he declared she should not go. As she went weeping to bed, distressed yet not in despair, she again put up her petition to the throne of grace, for she felt that she must go to the preaching.
Next morning she again begged her husband to let her go. "Well, go then," he replied, "but mind you come away directly the preaching is over, for if you stay to the hymn I'll kick you all the way home.”
With a heart full of thankfulness for the permission, so churlishly given, the poor woman hastened to the house where the meeting was held. The preacher was an earnest and devoted servant of God, and his words fell as summer rain on the parched ground, upon the soul of the drunkard's wife; she was comforted and refreshed.
The time passed rapidly away, the preacher finished his address, the hymn was given out and sung, and not until the meeting was over did she remember her husband's threat, which she had good reason to fear would be carried out to the letter.
Meanwhile her husband had seen his wife set out to the preaching with feelings of anger, wondering to himself why he had yielded to her entreaties. "But if she stops, she shall suffer for it," he muttered.
After a time he thought he would follow her, so as to be ready to put his threat into execution if she dared to disobey him.
As he, approached the house he heard voices singing—
“I do believe, I will believe,
That Jesus died for me;
That on the cross He shed His blood,
From sin to set me free.
Not only on his ear, but on his heart the words fell; never before had he felt so strangely impressed. The savage intention to "kick his wife all the way home," gradually passed away, and when she came out of the house, trembling with fear and almost ready to sink on the ground at the sight of him, she was astonished to find that he offered her no violence; he did not even speak an abusive word, but walked in silence by her side all the way home.
Still more astonished was she when he himself proposed that they should both go on the following evening to hear the preacher. He went, and the Lord met with him there, convinced him of sin, and soon after he was enabled to rejoice in the finished salvation which Christ has wrought out for every sinner who believes in Him.
From this time all was changed in the hut; the lion had become a lamb. Time proved the reality of the change, for each day saw him growing in grace and in the knowledge of the Saviour. "Oh, Marian," said the thankful wife, when telling her friend of the happy state of things, "you cannot think what a change it is! I am so happy, I can only sing and praise God. I get no more blows or hard words, my husband is so kind and loving—why it is just like courting days come back, only ever so much better.”
Marian, whose Christian sympathy had often comforted the poor wife in the dark days of sorrow through which she had passed, was now ready to rejoice with her in her joy, and together they praised God for His marvelous grace in plucking the husband as a brand from the burning.
This man, once the bond slave of Satan, now became an earnest and devoted servant of Christ, and showed by his walk and conversation that "old things had passed away, and all things had become new"; he loved to speak to all with whom he came in contact of that Saviour Who had saved him, and Who gives him the joy of God's salvation.
M. M. B.