IT was a bright, frosty, winter’s morning, when Alice started on her journey. The ground was thickly covered with snow; the various roads, as well as the short cuts and footpaths, were completely hidden from the eye; all around was white, and looked pure and beautiful. Not one human being was to be seen by Alice, nor did sound of living creature break the stillness, save when a few rooks flew right above the girl’s head, or dose to the white ground, skirting it with the tips of their glossy wings.
As Alice was thus wending her way across the snow-clad common, she thought, “How wonderful is it to be a poor vile sinner, washed in the blood of Christ; and not only washed—saved—but made a new, an entirely ‘new creature in Christ Jesus’ —united to Him accepted in Him. Now, through grace, in God’s sight whiter than this spotless snow; once by nature blacker far than these rooks flying around me.” (Psa. 10:7; 14:1, 2, 37His mouth is full of cursing and deceit and fraud: under his tongue is mischief and vanity. (Psalm 10:7)
1<<To the chief Musician, A Psalm of David.>> The fool hath said in his heart, There is no God. They are corrupt, they have done abominable works, there is none that doeth good. 2The Lord looked down from heaven upon the children of men, to see if there were any that did understand, and seek God. 3They are all gone aside, they are all together become filthy: there is none that doeth good, no, not one. (Psalm 14:1‑3). Rom. 3:10, 2310As it is written, There is none righteous, no, not one: (Romans 3:10)
23For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God; (Romans 3:23)). How spotlessly white the blood of the Lamb has washed all who believe! The Lord can look down from where He is, and, seeing the believer, can say of him, “Thou art all fair, my love; there is no spot in thee.” (Sol. 4:77Thou art all fair, my love; there is no spot in thee. (Song of Solomon 4:7)).
On and on she went, her eyes ever fixed on a group of fir trees near the house she had to reach. She knew if she did not keep that particular group as the object before her, she must lose her way. Roads, footpaths, there were none, and hence, once to lose sight of the fir trees would be to miss her way.
And is it not so with the believer today? If Christ be our object, the eye rivetted on Him, how can we go astray? The way in which He leads may indeed be pathless, but He is Himself our Way.
Alice had not been very long on the common before the thought struck her, “I shall be some time before I reach those trees, is there nothing I can do for the Lord upon my way?”
“Yes,” she thought, “there is; I will write some of His words in the snow, perchance some traveler may read them, and learn of Him.” So, stooping down, she wrote with her finger— “Come unto Me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.” (Matt. 11:2828Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. (Matthew 11:28)). “Come now, and let us reason together, saith the Lord: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool.” (Isa. 1:1818Come now, and let us reason together, saith the Lord: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool. (Isaiah 1:18)). “The blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanseth us from all sin.” (1 John 1:77But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin. (1 John 1:7)).
There was no one in sight but after having delivered her message at the house to which she was called to go, what was her great delight at beholding, on her way home, all the texts written out again and again! Who it was who had copied them the Lord did not mean her to know, but some one had found pleasure in tracing the living words.
Dear young reader, are you like the black rooks or like the white snow? Have you been washed and made clean from sin by the blood of Jesus?
N.