WE have given many incidents in our Magazine concerning “Uncle John.” He was the “Billy Bray” of America, and his life and testimony are fragrant with bright and holy memories. In the prayer circle he became a power. In the schoolhouses out of town, where meetings were often held, his help was sought. One such visit of his comes up as we write. It probably occurred a year or two after his conversion. It was a cold winter night, and the little old schoolhouse on the hill was packed. The Spirit of God was working in the district, and many were inquiring or rejoicing in the truth. Others were ill at ease. Uncle John was at home in such a place: especially at home on that particular spot and amid the group gathered there. On these very benches he sat in boyhood, and some of these fathers and mothers were then by his side. The exercises of the hour have faded from our mind, but one association of the night remains. When the people had started homeward along the roads or across the fields, out came ringing one of the melodies of those days. Uncle John was leading in the hymn, and half-a-dozen others were joining in, and though they were probably half a mile away, every ward reported itself on the keen frosty air. Some who stopped to listen thought the strains almost sweet enough to be the echoes of celestial songs. Let the worldling sneer or the sceptic smile at the mention of such scenes and seasons, but we will remember the years of the right hand of the Most High.
But there were to enter into the drill of the soldier experiences of a sterner kind, If there is a land of Beulah for the Christian to pass through, there is a valley of Baca too. Uncle John is to see a happy home break up, its lights one by one go out, its members pass away, till he is left utterly alone. He is to say like many another
“And lonely rooms and suffering beds,
These for my training-place were given.”
Two boys, with the wife, made up his household. The younger sickened first. He died in September. The elder, a lad of nine years, an uncommonly bright and interesting child, was taken the following autumn, after an illness of but a few hours. He breathed his last in parental arms, whispering the clear Lord’s words, “Suffer the little children to come unto Me.”
Under these repeated strokes the wife and mother, never strong, gave way. A year of weary wasting and patient suffering followed, and then she found the rest remaining to the people of God. That cheerless autumn night was the only time when we ever saw Uncle John even momentarily cast down. Then for half an hour he did lie down and weep like a heartbroken child. Nor was it strange. Long watching had nearly worn him out. Only four weeks previously he had closed his venerable father’s eyes for the last long sleep. The loves of earth had been breaking fast. But faith quickly rose again and rejoiced in God. The eagle flies highest not in serene but stormy skies, and the believer beats heavenward when the hours are dark and the tempest wild. The heart of the lonely man recovered soon the old peace and trust, and exulted in the Rock of his salvation. Like the needle of the mariner, deflected for an instant when a storm first strikes the ship, but swinging right and holding steady soon, the smitten soul turned to its Stay and Rest. For those who had gone it was worship. For the one left it was work yet for a little while. With soul new-braced let him go to it—new-braced by sorrow as well as joy: disciplined by loss no less than gain. He was to be a son of consolation to many a mourner in coming days. He was to minister to smitten spirits with a woman’s tenderness. He was to look into eyes dim with tears, and say, “I have been in this very pass, and know its bitterness and blessedness.”