AN infidel was once giving a lecture, telling his listeners that he did not believe in either God or the Bible.
When he had finished speaking, he invited anyone who disagreed with him to speak up and say why they thought there is a God and that the Bible is true.
An elderly woman stood up. Her back was bent and she was poorly dressed, but she walked up to the man and in a clear voice said, “Sir, I have a question for you.”
“Well, my good woman, what is it?”
“Ten years ago,” she replied, “my husband died and I was left with eight children. I had no money and no means of supporting myself and my children. I had nothing to call my own except this Bible.
“I have read my Bible during these years and by the guidance and direction I have gotten from it, and trusting in God for strength, I have been able to feed myself and my family.
“I am an old woman now and I am nearing the end of my life. But I am perfectly happy because I look forward to everlasting life with Jesus.
“That is what my belief in the Lord Jesus Christ has done for me. What has your way of thinking done for you?”
“Well, my good lady,” said the infidel, “I don’t want to disturb your comfort, but—”
“That is not the question,” she answered. “Stick to the point. What has your way of thinking done for you?”
Again he tried to get out of answering the woman’s question. The audience clapped their hands in approval and called out encouragement to the woman and challenges to the man. But the infidel would not try to answer. He walked off the platform defeated and the meeting came to an end.
The infidel speaker could tell nothing of how he had been helped by his unbelief. He had rejected God and the Bible and Jesus Christ, the Son of God. What could he say, what would he dare to say, when his only honest answer would be that he was a lost sinner on the way to eternity in hell.
May God give you, dear reader, the same simple faith that that woman had. She trusted in Him for help and strength in her great need and she was not disappointed.
That old woman trusted in God for her soul’s salvation. For that, too, she had His sure promise.
ML-03/24/1963