Memory Verse: “Thou God seest me.” Genesis 16:13
I was traveling on horseback in Brazil, says a missionary, between two mountains, on the way to a meeting. I had with me a Brazilian guide, who also was an active gospel preacher. I asked him to tell me how he was converted, and he told me this interesting story.
His name was Prudenciano. He and another man had once arranged to do away with an enemy, and they had agreed on the time and place to do the dark deed. The hour was to be late at night, and Prenciano accordingly set out alone for the meeting place in the moonlight.
It was a clear night and full moon. When one is going to do a dark deed, too much light is a great inconvenience, so thought Prudeiano, and the moon overhead troubled him. He had to pass over open ground, and heartily wished that the moon would not shine so brightly. Looking up at it from time to time, there was the “man in the moon,” as it appeared to be, watching with his two great eyes, and Prudenciano began to feel very uncomfortable. The watcher, hover, kept up the stare, and showed no signs of hiding his face behind a cloud. Prudenciano began to think, and to waver. If the “man in the moon” made him feel so uncomfortable, what about God? The idea of God looking on, and taking note, had not before occurred to him.
Soon he felt he could go no further, and slowly went back home. There he got out of sight of the “man in the moon,” but the thought that God was ever watching him in all his movements began to haunt him. He thought of other misdeeds he had committed, and these began now to trouble him. He had in his house a book of prayers, and these he began to read and repeat, but he got no relief for his soul from these exercises. He also possessed a New Testament which he now began to study closely. He read on until he came to the verse Mark 16:16: “He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved.” Prudenciano believed, he saw himself to be a great sinner, but he also saw Jesus as a Saviour who was greater than all his sins, and this brought peace to his troubled soul.
Soon after this Prudenciano heard of gospel meetings where the Book was explained, and to these he went with great eagerness. God blessed him and he became a faithful preacher of the gospel, traveling for miles around that part of the country, taking the message of redeeming love to many who sat in darkness, like he himself once was in.
The conversion of Prudenciano shows that still God chooses “things which are not” (1 Cor. 1:28) to fulfill His blest purposes of love to lost sinners.
“Thou God seest me.” Genesis 16:13. “This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners; of whom I am chief.” 1 Timothy 1:15.
ML-12/09/1979