IT was a hot day in July, when I was seated in a long car, traveling for thirty miles through the north-west of Ireland.
On looking round, I saw a boy on the opposite side of the car. A big tear stood in his eye as he pulled out his little bundle, containing a tin-plate, a knife and fork and mug, together with such other necessaries as emigrants generally carry. These were neatly tied up in a clean white cloth, out of which he took two slices of bread. One slice he handed me, the other he began eating himself.
“Ah! I know who put that up for you,” said I.
“Yes, sir; mother thought I’d want it on the way. She said, ‘Maybe, Tom, you’ll feel hungry on the journey.’”
I asked if he were going far.
“Yes, sir; I’m going to New York.”
“Are you leaving behind any that you love?” I inquired.
“Yes, sir; I’m leaving my poor mother and three sisters in Mullaughmore. And mother’s a widow, sir; I’m her only son; and she does take it to heart so, my going away. Still she says, ‘Tom, it’ll be for the best by-and-by.’”
One tear after another ran down the little emigrant’s cheek; and, putting my arm round his neck, I told him how I had come from America a few weeks before, and wondered he, so young, should go all alone to that strange country.
“Oh, but, sir, I’ve got two sisters across there, who wrote for me to go, and, sent six pounds for my passage-money.; and in their letter they said they’d meet me at the landing-stage.”
“And are you cure that they will meet you?”
“Yes, sir; and why wouldn’t they, when they said they would? Sure you don’t think they’d break their promise?”
“Now, tell me, my boy, why don’t you think they would deceive you?”
“Oh, ‘cause I know they love me; they really want to have me with them; and in order that I might go they paid my journey in the “Europa,” that sails from Londonderry tomorrow.”
“That is the very same reason why we trust God,” said I, “because He loves us so much that He paid the passage-money to take us to heaven. What your sisters in New York paid was only six pounds, but God gave His own Son to die for us. You will not have to pay a second time, because your sisters have paid fully; and we do not, nor can we, pay what Christ has paid to take us to heaven. And God really wants to have such sinners as we are with Him, to be happy forever. You cannot see your sisters—they live more than three thousand miles away―but you got a letter from them, and so you act on it. That is faith.
“But, you see, Tom, it is possible your sisters would not be able to keep their promise; but our Great Friend who said, Him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out’ (John 6:3737All that the Father giveth me shall come to me; and him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out. (John 6:37)), certainly will keep His; because besides His love being boundless, His power is almighty. If we trust Him now, as you trust your sisters, then we shall have a Friend to welcome us across in the other world, where all things are made new by the glory of His presence.”
It is strange how we doubt God!
Anon.