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Wonderful Bi 
 Conversions 
 
 By 
 
 LOUIS ALBERT BANKS 
 
 Author of “ The New Ten Commandmentsetc . 
 
 New York Chicago 
 
 Fleming H. Revell Company 
 
 London and Edinburgh 
 
Copyright, 1923, by 
 
 FLEMING H. REVELL COMPANY 
 
 New York: 158 Fifth Avenue 
 Chicago: 17 North Wabash Ave. 
 London: 21 Paternoster Square 
 Edinburgh: 75 Princes Street 
 
To 
 
 My Sister 
 MARIA BANKS 
 
Digitized by the Internet Archive 
 in 2019 with funding from 
 Princeton Theological Seminary Library 
 
 https://archive.org/details/wonderfulbiblecoOObank 
 
Introduction 
 
 I SAIAH prophesied about Jesus that “His 
 name shall be called Wonderful.” And while 
 there are many angles from which we might 
 review the life and personality of Jesus in which 
 He realizes and fulfills that prophecy, the most 
 wonderful thing about Jesus is His power to for¬ 
 give sins. That is the supreme wonder about 
 Jesus. The men and women who came in contact 
 with Him, and, meeting Him, lost their sins and 
 became free from their gloom and burden and 
 power, shine like stars along the trail which the 
 Master made glorious by His divinely exercised 
 power to bring men from darkness to light and 
 from the power of Satan unto God. 
 
 He loved to feed men’s fainting bodies, but He 
 loved most to feed their souls with the bread of 
 life. He was glad when He could say to a loath¬ 
 some leper; “Be thou clean!” but His greatest 
 exultation was when He could cleanse the filthy 
 soul. He lost no chance to open a blind man’s 
 eyes, but He was happier when He opened a dark¬ 
 ened mind and filled a gloomy heart with the light 
 from heaven. He was glad to give a palsied man 
 
 7 
 
8 
 
 INTRODUCTION 
 
 power to walk and carry his bed home on his 
 shoulder, but His greatest rejoicing was when He 
 could say to him: “ Thy sins, which are many, are 
 all forgiven thee.” 
 
 That power to break the handcuffs and shackles 
 of wicked habit and set free the slaves of sin is 
 the supreme wonder about Christ. And, thank 
 God, He is still the same wonderful Saviour. 
 
 It has been my blessed privilege to witness the 
 exercise of this power of Christ to forgive sins 
 and to save the sinner in many thousands of cases. 
 
 I well remember one watch-night service when 
 the people gathered as early as eight o'clock, and 
 for four hours, with prayer and song and grateful 
 testimony to Christ’s redeeming love, watched for 
 the coming in of the New Year. 
 
 Rather early in the evening a very large, middle- 
 aged man, evidently intoxicated, staggered into the 
 church and sat down in the back seat and, after 
 a while, fell asleep. He awoke in an hour or two, 
 slowly coming out from the power of the drink. 
 When at last I made an earnest appeal for sinners 
 to accept Christ, he seemed much affected and sat 
 sobbing and crying quietly. As the meeting con¬ 
 tinued, and earnest laymen were counselling and 
 praying with others at the altar, I went back to 
 interview this drunkard. He was a very repulsive 
 spectacle. He had been down in the mud and 
 
INTRODUCTION 
 
 9 
 
 rolled in it until his ragged coat was plastered all 
 over the back and sides; his trousers were torn 
 open at both knees; his face was swollen, his nose 
 and cheeks had the red lines of drunkenness, and 
 his eyes were bloodshot. I sat down beside him 
 and pleaded with him to give his heart to Christ 
 and start the New Year with a new heart and a 
 new life. He was sick enough of his sins, but 
 was hopeless. The burden of his cry was: 
 “ What’s the use ? I cannot stop the drink. I tell 
 you, Dominie, it’s got me! It’s got me! ” 
 
 I never in my life saw a more unlikely case, 
 yet I knew Christ had power to save him if I could 
 waken a desire in his poor, hopeless, wicked heart 
 to accept and surrender to Jesus. At last he 
 seemed touched that I did not seem afraid or 
 ashamed of putting my arm about his mud-soaked 
 shoulders, and said that it was a shame to come 
 into a decent church in such a condition. But I 
 urged: “ Man, your coat is clean compared with 
 your soul! Your coat will brush off when it gets 
 dry, but your soul is full of dirt and filth that 
 only the blood of Jesus Christ can ever wash out— 
 but He can make it white as snow.” 
 
 At last the man roused enough to say, “ You 
 really talk like you believe that! ” 
 
 “ Oh, brother! I do believe it, I know it! Con¬ 
 fess Jesus here and now and He will confess you 
 
10 
 
 INTRODUCTION 
 
 before God and forgive your sins and cleanse your 
 heart and help you to be a good, sober, clean 
 man! ” 
 
 He stared into my eyes a moment, and then 
 said: “What shall I do? ” 
 
 It was the Philippian jailer’s old question over 
 again. I knew I had won. 
 
 “ Do ? ” I exclaimed. “ Come with me to the 
 altar and give your heart to God through Jesus 
 Christ! ” 
 
 “ What! Go up there among those well-dressed 
 ladies looking like a hog? ” 
 
 “ Yes,” I said. “ They will be glad to have you 
 come.” 
 
 I broke in on whatever was doing at the front 
 of the church with a shout: “ Sing 4 Just as I 
 am! ’ ” And they began to sing the grand old 
 redemption hymn: 
 
 “ Just as I am, without one plea 
 
 But that Thy blood was shed for me. 
 
 And that Thou bid’st me come to Thee, 
 
 O Lamb of God, I come, I come.” 
 
 I got the man to his feet. He was now sobbing 
 like a child. With one arm about his muddy body 
 I led him up to the altar, where he flung himself 
 on the mercy of God through Jesus Christ. 
 
 Christ met him right there in a wonderful sal- 
 
INTRODUCTION 
 
 11 
 
 vation. With great humility he begged for our 
 consideration and our prayers. The next night he 
 was back; but his face was clean and his torn 
 clothes had been cleaned and patched. He got up 
 when he had a chance and said: “ Jesus Christ has 
 wonderfully kept me from drink and all sin for 
 one whole day! ” The next night his testimony 
 was for two days. 
 
 The third day he got work. He was an iron 
 moulder and earned good wages. By the time he 
 had twenty days to thank God for, he had a splen¬ 
 did new suit of clothes and every one remarked, 
 “ What a handsome man he is! ” He hunted up 
 his mother, rented a good home, placed her there 
 as a queen, and no queen was ever prouder than 
 she of her noble son now redeemed by the won¬ 
 derful love and power of Christ. “ His name 
 shall be called Wonderful! ” 
 
 Christ has that same wonderful power now. 
 Some who see these w T ords need it as much as did 
 that drunken moulder. Oh, I know you would 
 say indignantly: “ I never drank a drop of liquor 
 in my life; I have always been respectable! ” No 
 doubt. But there are other sins just as evil in the 
 sight of God. What about envy? It was envy 
 that drove Cain to murder his own brother. What 
 about jealousy? It was jealousy that crucified 
 Jesus—and Pilate knew it! What about greed. 
 
12 
 
 INTRODUCTION 
 
 the love of money, the determination to get rich 
 at any cost? That was the sin that drove Judas 
 to betray his Lord with a kiss. 
 
 Oh, man, woman, I do not know what your own 
 peculiar sin is! but God knows what it is. And 
 you know what is eating like a canker, like an evil 
 worm, at the root of your tree of happiness. And 
 whatever it is, it must be destroyed. You must be 
 saved from it or be lost. You must be forgiven 
 and taken from the power of your sin and set free. 
 And, thank God, Jesus Christ can do that won¬ 
 derful thing for you here and now. It is a won¬ 
 derful thing to do! But that is His very name— 
 “ His name shall be called Wonderful ! ” 
 
 L. A. B. 
 
Contents 
 
 I. Taming the Wild Man of Gadara . 15 
 
 II. The Woman Who Forgot Her 
 
 Water-pot.27 
 
 III. The Sinner Who Came to Jesus 
 
 Through the Roof . . .41 
 
 IV. The Calling of Matthew Levi . 53 
 
 V. The Night Jesus Spent With Zac- 
 
 CHiEus of Jericho .... 64 
 
 VI. The Prodigal Son and His Elder 
 
 Brother.75 
 
 VII. The Two Dinners in Simon’s House . 93 
 
 VIII. Three Interesting Witnesses for 
 
 Christ.106 
 
 IX. The Restoration of Peter . . 117 
 
 X. The Open Secrets of Pentecost . 127 
 
 XI. Mercy and Healing at the Beautiful 
 
 Gate.139 
 
 XII. The Conversion of the Chief of 
 
 Sinners.152 
 
 XIII. The Conversion of a Roman Cen¬ 
 
 turion and His Friends . .163 
 
 XIV. The Story of a Midnight Conversion 176 
 
I 
 
 TAMING THE WILD MAN OF GADARA 
 
 “And no man had strength to tame him.” 
 
 —Mark 5 : 4. 
 
 “ Behold him that was possessed with demons sit¬ 
 ting, clothed and in his right mind, even him that had 
 the legion — Mark 5 : 15. 
 
 I T was the morning after the storm on the lake 
 that had so frightened the disciples when 
 Jesus, aroused by them, had said to the angry 
 waves: “ Peace, be still,” and the heaving billows 
 had become calm. The disciples had been greatly 
 awed and amazed at this exhibition of Christ’s 
 power, and it was perhaps partly to show them 
 the far more important work Christianity must do 
 that He brought them the next day to this country 
 of the Gerasenes and landed at Gadara. Here it 
 
 f 
 
 was that a man whom, for convenience’ sake, we 
 
 will call Demos, met them. 
 
 Demos was known as the Wild Man of Gadara. 
 
 His mind and heart were the abode of unclean 
 
 spirits which mastered him completely, so that he 
 
 lived a wretched life, a curse to himself and a 
 
 danger and a threat to others. With what graphic 
 
 force Mark describes his condition: 
 
 15 
 
16 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 “ A man with an unclean spirit, who had his dwell¬ 
 ing in the tombs: and no man could any more bind 
 him, no, not with a chain; because that he had been 
 often bound with fetters and chains, and the chains 
 had been rent asunder by him, and the fetters broken 
 in pieces: and no man had strength to tame him. 
 And always, night and day, in the tombs and in the 
 mountains, he was crying out, and cutting himself 
 with stones.” 
 
 This was the man who came running down to 
 the beach to meet Jesus when He landed in com¬ 
 pany with His disciples. He did not come of his 
 own accord. He was devil-driven, and the devils 
 worshiped Christ, and Jesus commanded them to 
 come out of the man. And the chief devil, who 
 held Demos in torment, exclaimed: “What have 
 I to do with thee, Jesus, thou Son of the Most 
 High God? I adjure thee by God, torment me 
 not.” And when Christ asked his name, he an¬ 
 swered: “ My name is Legion, for we are many.” 
 And then he asked for Christ's permission to take 
 possession of a herd of two thousand hogs near 
 by; and for some reason which Christ deemed 
 wise, He gave them permission, and they entered 
 into the swine, and the animals rushed into the 
 sea and were drowned, and their herders, alarmed 
 and excited, ran away to find the men who owned 
 the hogs. 
 
 Now, while all this was going on, Demos, res¬ 
 cued from the evil spirits and realizing his condi- 
 
THE WILD MAN OP GADARA 
 
 17 
 
 tion, had gone and secured proper clothes, and by; 
 the time the hog-raisers came to see what had be¬ 
 come of their herds, they found Demos, the wild 
 man, wild no longer, but sitting with Jesus and 
 His disciples, clothed and in his right mind. But 
 all this was of no account to the hog-raisers. They 
 were not interested in men; all their interests were 
 in hogs. So they begged Christ to depart out of 
 their coasts. We may well believe they were 
 pretty badly scared or they would have come with 
 stones and spears. 
 
 It reminds one of the old days when we were 
 fighting the foul liquor saloons that filled so many 
 men—and women, too—with unclean spirits; when 
 there was nothing the saloon owners dreaded so 
 much as a Christian church—and well they feared 
 the Church, for it was the team-work of the Chris¬ 
 tian churches that finally drove the saloons like 
 the swine of Gadara into the sea, and, please God, 
 bootleggers’ dens will soon go the same way. 
 
 After a little, when Jesus and His disciples were 
 preparing to depart. Demos became very anxious 
 and begged Jesus that he might be permitted to go 
 with Him. But Christ saw that it was better for 
 him to go back to his home, and said: “ Go to thy 
 house unto thy friends, and tell them how great 
 things the Lord hath done for thee, and how he 
 had mercy on thee.” 
 
18 [WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 No doubt Demos watched from the landing, 
 with eyes wet with tears, as long as he could keep 
 them in view, waving his hand ever and again in 
 grateful love to the wonderful Saviour who had 
 set him free from the wretched uncleanness of soul 
 which had wrecked and despoiled his life. And 
 then, with a deep sigh, he turned his face toward 
 home. 
 
 Now, with our knowledge of life and human 
 nature, it is not hard for our imagination to repro¬ 
 duce the story of Demos. It is not at all an un¬ 
 common story in its great essential fundamentals. 
 
 Demos was a bright boy, born far back in the 
 land of the Gerasenes, who had the great mis¬ 
 fortune to be born into a family of easy-going 
 parents who allowed him to grow' up without 
 learning the important lesson of obedience. He 
 had inherited a quick temper that was like a 
 powder flash; and when he was a little boy it was 
 counted great sport in the family to stir up Demos, 
 as one would a pet tiger cub, and see him spit out 
 his baby anger. 
 
 It was not such good sport when he got older; 
 but it was easier then to pet him and smooth his 
 fur the right way than to enforce obedience on a 
 spoiled boy. And so he grew to manhood with 
 no law but his wild, ungoverned temper. There 
 were days when he was a delightful companion. 
 
THE WILD MAN OF GADARA 
 
 19 
 
 when everything went to please him; and others 
 when hell seemed to be let loose, when he was 
 crossed. He is not an uncommon type. 
 
 Demos won the love of a good girl and started 
 his home; and then every little while the fur began 
 to fly. There is no place where self-control and 
 patience are more in demand than in marriage. It 
 is no place for lawlessness, and Demos was law¬ 
 less. His wife loved him devotedly at first, and 
 bore much in silent suffering, and then in self- 
 defense came back in protest. Demos chafed 
 under restraint. As he grew older, and as the 
 burdens of life increased, he grew worse every 
 day. Instead of a flash of lightning, followed by 
 smiles, the flash of temper began to be followed by 
 sullenness. He became a man with a grouch, and 
 after a while the grouch came to stay. 
 
 He was like Cain: At first he was only envious 
 of Abel now and then, and between times loved 
 him as when they were boyish playfellows. But 
 after a while he began to hate Abel, and then the 
 hate settled down into sullenness. Cain’s counte¬ 
 nance changed. He lost the way to laughter-town. 
 God saw it and knew his danger and reasoned with 
 him and warned him. In substance, God said: 
 “ Look out, Cain, there is danger in that envy and 
 hate; it is like a wild beast crouching at the door.” 
 But Cain went on hating, and one day in the 
 
20 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 field, when he met his brother, that seething hell of 
 hate in his heart burst forth, and he killed Abel, 
 and became a vagabond on the face of the earth. 
 
 Beware of allowing your evil temper to have 
 sway. Men and women ought to learn this lesson 
 in childhood. Family government ought to teach 
 children God’s government. The decay of family 
 government is, to my mind, one of the most seri¬ 
 ous and dangerous signs of the times in all the 
 world of our day. If boys and girls do not learn 
 to obey while they are children, they will certainly 
 chafe under discipline and law in later life. Chil¬ 
 dren who grow up where the Bible, out of which 
 lessons of love and spiritual illumination are 
 drawn daily at the family altar, lies side by side 
 with the rod of discipline as a symbol of govern¬ 
 ment and obedience, grow up not only to love and 
 reverence their parents, but to be law-abiding 
 citizens; the soldiers of the common good, who 
 can be relied upon to sustain the free institutions 
 of the Republic. If we are to turn back the deadly 
 tide of bolshevism and anarchy threatening the 
 world to-day, we must bring back the family altar 
 with its family worship, and the loving but firm 
 Christian government of children that will teach 
 them that obedience to law is liberty. 
 
 Demos never learned that lesson of self-control, 
 and first the hot, stinging lash of his tongue, when 
 
THE WILD MAN OF GAD AKA 
 
 21 
 
 in temper; and later the still more brutal and bitter 
 sullenness, which is temper after it is ripe, broke 
 his wife’s heart and made him a source of dread 
 and fear to his children. And so, step by step, 
 Demos took his dark trail to the day when the 
 grouch never left his brow, and the devils were in 
 complete control. 
 
 You remember how Robert Louis Stevenson, in 
 “ The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde,” 
 tells a parallel story to that of Demos. Dr. Jekyll 
 has discovered a drug which will transform him 
 into Mr. Hyde. Dr. Jekyll, the kind-hearted, 
 gracious-minded, genial-souled physician, under 
 the influence of that drug becomes the mean, ugly, 
 dwarfed Mr. Hyde, a creature controlled by mur¬ 
 derous hates and vicious passions. 
 
 The great mistake Dr. Jekyll made was the belief 
 that he could pass back from Hyde to Jekyll at 
 will. As he went on, he lost that power, and 
 found himself slipping into the devilish Hyde un¬ 
 awares, and then, after a while, Hyde comes to 
 stay and his nobler self is lost entirely. 
 
 So Demos came at last to be an outlaw who 
 wandered far from home, an outcast in the tombs 
 and in the mountains, a curse to himself and to 
 every one who knew him. 
 
 And then he meets Jesus on the beach of 
 
 Gadara. The devils are cast out. His unclean 
 * 
 
22 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 soul is set free. His evil tempers are mastered by 
 divine love. And the master who has redeemed 
 him and set him free says: “ Go to thy house unto 
 thy friends, and tell them how great things the 
 Lord hath done for thee, and how he had mercy 
 on thee.” 
 
 Now the wonderful Saviour has gone, and the 
 test of his salvation has come. He starts home. 
 He had intended to go clear home before he said 
 a word to any one about what had happened; but 
 as he goes he recalls what a wonderful change has 
 come over his life, and he gets so happy he cannot 
 keep still: “Thank God! Dear Jesus, how good 
 He was to me! ” And just then he meets a man 
 and tells him the whole story, and after that he 
 goes on telling every one he meets until the story 
 runs everywhere through the whole countryside. 
 
 Now you will note that Christ’s command was, 
 “ Tell them how great things the Lord hath done 
 for thee; ” but Demos went on his way shouting 
 how great things Jesus had done for him. Jesus 
 was all the Lord Demos knew; and wiser than he 
 knew, he went on giving glory to Christ for his 
 salvation. 
 
 Good news, like bad news, scatters fast and 
 everywhere from town to town, and from house 
 to house went the wonderful story that Demos, 
 the wild man of Gadara, had met Jesus and had 
 
THE WILD MAN OF GADARA 
 
 23 
 
 lost his devils, and was wild no more, but was full 
 of wonderful joy and happiness, and never lost 
 a chance to tell what glorious things Jesus had 
 done for him. So it was that the news of his 
 salvation reached home ahead of him. 
 
 At first his poor wife, who had suffered so much 
 at his hands, could not believe it. “ I hope he does 
 not come here! I used to love him. My! how I 
 did love him! God only knows how I loved him! 
 But he treated me so badly; I have suffered so 
 much from his vile temper, and he has been so 
 mean and wicked, not only to me but to the chil¬ 
 dren, that I never want to see him again.” 
 
 But the news kept coming. One after another 
 came and said, “ Mary, a wonderful change has 
 come over Demos. He’s not the same man. You 
 know how sullen and bitter he was. Now his face 
 is full of smiles, and when he tells about meeting 
 Jesus and losing all his evil spirits, he laughs aloud 
 and happy tears fill his eyes and wet his cheeks.” 
 
 “ What! Demos laughs ? Why, he never 
 laughed once for a year before he left! That is 
 as he used to be before we were married, and at 
 times afterward. Oh, if it could be! If it could 
 be that he has been set free from those wicked 
 tempers! But it’s too good to be true! ” 
 
 And then, at last, a neighbour boy comes run¬ 
 ning and shouts to her: “Demos is in town; 
 
24 WONDEBFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 yonder they come down the street. The people 
 are leaving their stores, and their homes, and are 
 bringing him home. Why, he’s the happiest man 
 you ever saw! ” 
 
 That was too much. Mary could not resist 
 that. How often she had tried to make him 
 happy, and failed. She had cooked dainties for 
 him, and done everything in her power to please 
 him and make him happy, but months had gone by 
 and she would not see him happy a single time. 
 Something wonderful had surely happened if 
 Demos was happy. She must see him. She could 
 stand it no longer, and with one hand holding her 
 little girl and the other clutching her boy, they 
 went out to meet that strange procession. As she 
 reached the gate she saw him coming with the crowd 
 of neighbours. Just then he saw her, and, some¬ 
 how, the old love came back to him, that years of 
 quarreling and sinful tempers had dulled and 
 blurred. She was his precious Mary again—the 
 girl who had seemed to him the fairest and sweet¬ 
 est of all God’s bright creation in womanhood— 
 and his heart broke at the memory of how he had 
 treated her; the way he had broken her heart and 
 filled her life with sorrow. But, as he was about 
 to halt with shame and despair, he remembered 
 Jesus and what He had done for him, and all else 
 was forgotten. He threw his arms aloft and 
 
THE WILD MAN OF GADARA 
 
 25 
 
 shouted as he ran toward her, “ Mary! See what 
 Jesus did for me! I am well again! The unclean 
 spirits are gone! And, O Mary! I never loved 
 you so much in all my life as I do to-day! And 
 with Jesus’ help I am going to be a good husband 
 and a good father! Forgive me, Mary! ” 
 
 By that time he had reached Mary. They had 
 found each other’s arms, and eyes and lips were 
 settling difficulties and estrangement faster and 
 more completely than any words could have done. 
 The children followed her to their father’s arms. 
 The neighbours, conscious that they were looking 
 on holy things, silently dispersed, and a Christian 
 family life began. 
 
 Thank God! Jesus is still performing miracles 
 just as wonderful as that, in all parts of the world 
 wherever His Gospel is being proclaimed. Men 
 and women gone wild with wicked tempers and 
 passions are being tamed as only Jesus has the 
 strength to tame them. Hearts and minds that 
 have become filthy dens of unclean spirits are be¬ 
 ing cleansed at the word of Christ to-day as in 
 the day when He landed at Gadara, and families 
 torn asunder are being reconciled by His divine 
 love; and Christian homes are being estab¬ 
 lished through the conversion of husbands and 
 wives. 
 
 Demos had just one chance. He had only one 
 
26 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 glimpse of Jesus, but that was enough to win sal¬ 
 vation. 
 
 Christ has landed on your coast. His heart is 
 full of love. His hands are full of blessings. Will 
 you take them ? No matter what your sin may be, 
 no matter what particular phase of uncleanness 
 has soiled your soul, Jesus has power to cleanse 
 and redeem you, and He can do it now. What¬ 
 ever unhappiness or gloom or defeat sin has 
 brought to your life, Christ has power to dispel it. 
 Christ can bring joy and laughter and content¬ 
 ment, and fill the future with abiding hope. 
 
II 
 
 THE WOMAN WHO FORGOT HER 
 WATER-POT 
 
 “ Po the woman left her water-pot, and went away 
 into the city, and saith to the people, Come, see a 
 man, who told me all things that ever I did: can 
 this he the Christt ” —John 4: 28-29. 
 
 I T was at the close of a hard day when Jesus 
 and His disciples came to the well of Sychar. 
 The Master was weary and remarked to His 
 friends that if they only had food it would be a 
 pleasant place to camp. And they, sensitive to 
 every desire of their wonderful Leader, begged 
 Him to remain while they went into the town to 
 buy food. And so Jesus sat down by the well to 
 rest while He waited for their return. 
 
 This was a famous well, which had been dug 
 by Jacob and his sons long ago, and in that primi¬ 
 tive day long before the wonderful inventions and 
 cooperation of our modern communities, where 
 water is brought to the humblest tenement in the 
 town or city. It was carried, usually on the shoul¬ 
 der or on the heads of women, to the hilltop, 
 where towns were built, because they could be 
 more easily defended. 
 
 27 
 
28 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 What wonders Jesus has wrought for woman¬ 
 hood! You can trace back to Jesus Christ and 
 His life and teaching the comradeship and re¬ 
 spect, an even-handed chance for education, and a 
 fair share in the blessings of life granted to women 
 in most civilized lands to-day* 
 
 Sychar was built on a hill, and the women car¬ 
 ried the water for home and household needs as 
 their mothers and grandmothers had done before 
 them. It did not occur to the men that the 
 stronger shoulder should carry the heavier burden. 
 That thought had to come through Christ’s Gospel 
 that the strong should bear the burdens of the 
 weak. Every woman should love and honour 
 Jesus Christ. I marvel when I see an intelligent 
 woman who does not revere Jesus. 
 
 While Jesus sat resting by the well of Jacob, a 
 woman came down from the top of the hill with 
 her great rawhide water-pot for water for her 
 house. She was not a woman of high standing 
 in Sychar. That she was an attractive woman we 
 are sure, since five different men had taken her to 
 wife. But life had not gone well with her, and 
 she had lost rather than gained in womanly dig¬ 
 nity, until at last she had weakly given herself to 
 an unblessed fellowship with a man, which is looked 
 at askance in every land, and which marked her as 
 a woman off-colour in the community. As she drew 
 
THE WOMAN WHO FORGOT 
 
 29 
 
 near the old well she looked with interest at the 
 tired man, and responded with sympathy when He 
 asked her for a drink of water from her water- 
 pot. She gave it to Him willingly, but expressed 
 her astonishment that He, being a Jew, should 
 humble Himself to ask a favour of her, seeing 
 that she was a Samaritan woman; for it was at 
 a time when the Jews and Samaritans were not 
 friendly and were not accustomed to deal in a 
 neighbourly manner with each other. 
 
 To this Jesus answered: “If thou knewest the 
 gift of God, and who it is that saith unto thee, 
 Give me to drink; thou wouldst have asked of him, 
 and he would have given thee living water.” 
 
 The woman is full of interest now, and says: 
 “ Sir, thou hast nothing to draw with, and the 
 well is deep: whence then hast thou that living 
 water? Art thou greater than our father Jacob, 
 who gave us the well, and drank thereof himself, 
 and his sons, and his cattle?” Jesus replied: 
 “ Every one that drinketh of this water shall thirst 
 again: but whosoever drinketh of the water that I 
 give him shall never thirst; but the water that I 
 shall give him shall become in him a well of water 
 springing up unto eternal life.” The woman evi¬ 
 dently grasped something of the wonderful claim 
 made by Christ, and she responded very simply 
 and directly: “Sir, give me this water, that 
 
30 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 I thirst not, neither come all the way hither to 
 draw.” 
 
 Then it was that the real conversational 
 wrestling match between Jesus and the woman of 
 Sychar began, the prize being the woman's soul. 
 Suddenly changing the subject entirely to outward 
 seeming, yet really continuing it straight as a die, 
 Jesus said: “Go, call thy husband, and come 
 hither.” In substance Jesus was saying: “If I 
 am to give you the water of eternal life, we must 
 first straighten out your social life; the people you 
 live with will have something to do about that. 
 The spiritual water that will slake the thirst of 
 your soul and become a fountain of contentment 
 and joy within you can come to you only when 
 your life is clean and pure, and your relations are 
 true and right in the sight of God.” So when 
 Jesus said: “Go, call thy husband,” it was like a 
 surgeon's knife thrust into the heart of a car¬ 
 buncle. The woman started in amazement: “I 
 have no husband.” 
 
 Then Jesus looked her calmly in the face and 
 said, not accusingly, but facing the ugly facts of 
 her life: “Thou saidst well, I have no husband: 
 for thou hast had five husbands, and he whom 
 thou now hast is not thy husband: this hast thou 
 said truly.” 
 
 The woman answered: “ Sir, I perceive that 
 
THE WOMAN WHO FORGOT 
 
 31 
 
 thou art a prophet. Our fathers worshipped in 
 this mountain; and ye say, that in Jerusalem is the 
 place where men ought to worship.” But Jesus 
 is determined to bring her face to face with the 
 chance of immediate salvation, and so He an¬ 
 swered: “ Woman, believe me, . . . the hour 
 
 cometh, and now is, when the true worshippers 
 shall worship the Father in spirit and truth: for 
 such doth the Father seek to be his worshippers. 
 God is a Spirit: and they that worship him must 
 worship in spirit and truth.” 
 
 The woman responds to this with true solemnity 
 and, showing that she had had careful religious 
 training in her youth, says, “ I know that Messiah 
 cometh (he that is called Christ): when he is 
 come, he will declare unto us all things.” 
 
 At last the moment of revelation has come: 
 Jesus frankly says to her, “ I that speak unto thee 
 am he.” 
 
 Just then, at that critical moment, came the 
 disciples, and as Jesus turned to greet them the 
 woman, in her excitement at His wonderful decla¬ 
 ration of Himself and His mission forgetting all 
 
 i 
 
 about her water-pot and the water she had come 
 for, hurried away into the city, feeling that she 
 must share with some one else the great news that 
 like a glorious sunrise of hope was illuminating 
 her own soul. 
 
32 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 The disciples were, no doubt, full of wonder at 
 finding their Master in such intimate conversation 
 with the woman; but they spread the evening 
 meal and urged Jesus to draw near and eat with 
 them. To their astonishment, Jesus was not 
 hungry. They had left Him not only tired, but 
 hungry; but now His hunger was gone. “ Who 
 has given him food ? ” they say one to another, 
 and Jesus, perceiving their wonder, roused Him¬ 
 self from His reverie and said: “I have meat to 
 eat that ye know not. My meat is to do the will 
 of him that sent me, and to accomplish his work.” 
 And, looking away across the fields where the 
 rapidly sinking sun shone brightly on their white 
 clothing, Jesus called the attention of His disciples 
 to a large group of people coming toward them, 
 and said: “ Say not ye, There are yet four months, 
 and then cometh the harvest? behold, I say unto 
 you, Lift up your eyes, and look on the fields, that 
 they are white already unto harvest. He that 
 reapeth receiveth wages, and gathereth fruit unto 
 life eternal; that he that soweth and he that reap¬ 
 eth may rejoice together. For herein is the say¬ 
 ing true. One soweth and another reapeth. I sent 
 you to reap that whereon ye have not laboured: 
 others have laboured, and ye are entered into their 
 labour.” 
 
 Now this is what had happened: The excited 
 
THE WOMAN WHO FORGOT 
 
 33 
 
 and aroused woman who had come to believe Jesus 
 was the Messiah, the Christ, as a result of her con¬ 
 versation with Him, had left her water-pot at the 
 well and had run into the city and had cried right 
 and left to every acquaintance she met: “A 
 wonderful man has come to Sychar! I left him 
 at the well of Jacob but just now! Come and 
 see him, he is wonderful, he reads one’s very soul, 
 he told me all the secrets of my life, he uncov¬ 
 ered my secret soul to me. Come! This must 
 be the Christ. Come with me and see him! ” And 
 a great group soon gathered and, fearing the 
 wonderful visitor may leave and pass on to some 
 other town, they follow the woman rapidly as 
 she leads them down the slope of the hill toward 
 the well where Jesus still lingers with His dis¬ 
 ciples. 
 
 There are some very interesting things in this 
 story—interesting especially to every one who 
 would learn the glorious art of winning souls to 
 Christ. The first of these in importance is that 
 this is the great, supreme soul food to the Chris¬ 
 tian. Jesus declared to His disciples that His 
 supreme food was to do the will of God in rela¬ 
 tion to men and women. He had been very tired 
 and very hungry until the woman came down from 
 Sychar to the well and He had the opportunity 
 
34 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 to be a help and a blessing to her; and in that 
 service weariness and hunger dropped away from 
 Him; He was fed and rested by that divine service. 
 
 It is a great test for ourselves as Christians. 
 To be a Christian is to be like Jesus. If we are 
 to be strong to do Christlike deeds, we must eat 
 of the food that made Him strong. The table 
 of human needs, of human sorrow and sin, is 
 spread all about us; if we are quick to respond to 
 our opportunities, as was Jesus, we may feed and 
 strengthen on the spiritual food which satisfied His 
 soul. We can only be spiritually strong and glad 
 by the service of our fellow men in the love and 
 self-forgetfulness which rested and refreshed our 
 Lord. 
 
 The forgetfulness of this new convert to Christ, 
 that sent her running up the hill into the town, 
 leaving her water-pot at the well, is suggestive of 
 a great truth: that spiritual matters are of supreme 
 importance and that one’s power to convince and 
 bless others concerning any spiritual revelation or 
 blessing he has received, depends on his being so 
 absorbed with it that all the ordinary affairs of 
 life become secondary and incidental to the great 
 thing, the fact of the divine Christ, His power 
 and willingness to forgive sins and save our souls 
 alive. When this woman came back from her 
 
THE WOMAN WHO FORGOT 
 
 35 
 
 conversation with Jesus, if she had brought her 
 water-pot as full as usual, and had spoken in 
 measured accents, she would have attracted little 
 or no attention. The very fact that she was so 
 excited that she had forgotten the water she went 
 for, and came running and hailed every one she 
 met with her excited story, made every listener 
 feel that something very unusual and important 
 had happened to her, and that it was worth in¬ 
 vestigating. Her very earnestness aroused them 
 out of their indifference to spiritual things and 
 broke through the hard shell of their absorption 
 in worldly affairs. My friends, if we are to cap¬ 
 ture a busy, absorbed world for our Christ, we, 
 too, must account Jesus to be the most interesting 
 and important personality we know about, and 
 deem the news that Christ is in our town with 
 power to forgive men and women their sins and 
 feed their souls with food from heaven and slake 
 their thirst with the water of eternal life to be of 
 first importance. If we really feel the vast and 
 immediate importance of this news, we, too, will 
 forget the ordinary affairs of the day in view of 
 the nearness of Christ, who is able to save unto 
 the uttermost every one who will come unto God 
 by Him. 
 
 We have also suggested on the highest authority 
 
36 „ WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 known to man that the richest harvest field of hu¬ 
 man endeavour is to win men and women to know 
 and love and trust Christ as their Saviour. It is 
 a great thing to heal and comfort the body, but 
 infinitely greater to heal or bless the soul. The 
 body will live for a few years, but the soul will 
 live forever. 
 
 The soul is the source of courage, hope, con¬ 
 tentment, peace, and no one can so bless the soul 
 and make it the fountain of all these precious 
 things as Jesus Christ. When you bring and in¬ 
 troduce a man or a woman or a boy or a girl to 
 Jesus, and insure a friendship with Him, you have 
 started a train of pure and joyous life, the wide¬ 
 spread blessing of which only God can tell. St 
 James says, speaking of one who causes a con¬ 
 version: “ Let him know, that he who converteth 
 a sinner from the error of his way shall save a 
 
 soul from death, and shall cover a multitude of 
 
 • ** 
 sms. 
 
 But he who wins a soul away from sin to Christ 
 not only does all that—not only prevents sin, and 
 saves from sorrow and death—but he starts a 
 career of hope and courage and love and purity 
 that shall go on filling the world with light and 
 joy through countless ages. Andrew brought 
 Simon Peter to Jesus; and all the marvelous glory 
 of Pentecost with thousands of joyous conversions 
 
THE WOMAN WHO FORGOT 
 
 37 
 
 was In that deed. A humble believer brought John 
 B. Gough to Jesus; and not only stopped one 
 drunkard from the downward path, but started a 
 current of sobriety and revolt against the saloon 
 that is yet being felt for righteousness to the ends 
 of the earth. The preacher who won Dwight L. 
 Moody, the shoe clerk, to Jesus little dreamed of 
 the stream of divine blessing he had started on its 
 way that day. The humble missionary who won 
 a wicked baseball player to his Lord had no vision 
 of the host that Billy Sunday would turn to right¬ 
 eousness. My friends, there is no gold mine with 
 such infinite possibilities of unsearchable wealth as 
 this! South Africa has no diamond field that 
 promises such a chance for lasting riches as is 
 within our reach in our opportunity to win jewels 
 for Christ's crown. 
 
 It is clearly revealed here that it is personal 
 effort which wins in saving souls. This woman's 
 cry was, “ Come, see a man who told me” “ Come, 
 see a man who told me my sins. Come, see a man 
 who told me all the evil things 1 did.” There was 
 nothing vague about that cry. It was personal 
 and definite. She was not arguing about some¬ 
 thing that was merely speculation; she was telling 
 about things she knew. You may not be able to 
 argue about Christ and His atonement in a way 
 
38 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 to convince others; but if you have yourself met 
 Jesus face to face, and talked with Him, and He 
 has uncovered your sins to you, and shown you 
 the way of escape from them, you have some news 
 to tell that men will be attracted to hear. It is the 
 personal note, the personal touch, that tells. How 
 well Paul knew that! Wherever he was he felt 
 that his own personal experience with Christ was 
 his most powerful message. Paul was a well- 
 trained lawyer and knew how to argue with the 
 best disputants of his day; but when he was 
 brought before kings and was called on for the 
 best that was in him, he always told his own per¬ 
 sonal experience—how he met Jesus in the way 
 and lost his sins at His feet. 
 
 Do not hide your own personal light, which 
 God has given to you, under a bushel. Neither 
 your talents, nor your scholarship, nor your 
 wealth, nor anything else can take the place of the 
 simple story of your personal experience with 
 Jesus in winning others away from their sins to 
 Christ. Don’t be too proud or too conservative 
 or too bashful to tell that story. Your silence may 
 do infinite harm. Gratitude to God and to your 
 Saviour should cause you gladly to tell the story 
 of Christ’s forgiveness of your sins and the bless¬ 
 ings that have come to you. The desire to bless 
 your fellow men should make you doubly w r illing 
 
THE WOMAN WHO FORGOT 
 
 39 
 
 to bear glad testimony to your own conversion. A 
 sense of honour and fidelity to your own soul 
 should make you faithful to bear witness to the 
 truth of your personal experience with Christ. 
 More people are won to Christ and become Chris¬ 
 tians through the testimony of some other saved 
 man or woman than in any other way. John, in 
 recording this story of the great revival that came 
 to Sychar, says: “And from that city many of 
 the Samaritans believed on him because of the 
 word of the woman, who testified, He told me all 
 things that ever I did. So when the Samaritans 
 came unto him, they besought him to abide with 
 them: and he abode there two days. And many 
 more believed because of his word; and they said 
 to the woman, Now we believe, not because of thy 
 speaking: for we have heard for ourselves, 
 and know that this is indeed the Saviour of the 
 world.’’ 
 
 At first glance this sounds as though they were 
 speaking rudely or slightingly to the woman. But 
 nothing of that kind is to be inferred. They are 
 only saying: “ At first we came to Christ because 
 of what you said, of your experience with Christ; 
 but we no longer have to rely on that, for we have 
 given our own hearts to Him, and He has given 
 us an experience in our own souls which makes us 
 known from the witness in our own consciences 
 
40 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 that He is the Saviour of the world, because He 
 has become our Saviour.” 
 
 Thank God, every one we bring to Jesus can 
 have that personal experience. The acid test of 
 Christianity for every one of us must be what it can 
 do and what it has done and does do for us in our 
 own lives. This woman was off-colour socially and 
 morally in Sychar, but Jesus brought back the glow 
 of goodness and moral health to her life. Every¬ 
 where where the name of Jesus is preached to¬ 
 day, He is doing that same glorious work. Men 
 as wild as the man of Gadara become sweet-tem¬ 
 pered and full of reason and peace. Women as 
 notorious in sin as the woman of Sychar become 
 examples of purity and noble womanhood in as¬ 
 sociation with Jesus. In His name every sin may 
 be overthrown and every sinner converted and 
 saved. None need hold back for fear his sin is 
 too great; He is able to save unto the uttermost 
 limit every one that will come unto God in His 
 blessed name! 
 
Ill 
 
 THE SINNER WHO CAME TO JESUS 
 THROUGH THE ROOF 
 
 “ But that ye may know that the Son of man hath 
 authority on earth to forgive sins (he saith to the 
 sick of the palsy), I say unto thee, Arise, and take 
 up thy hed, and go unto thy house . And he arose, 
 and straightway took up the hed, and went forth be¬ 
 fore them all; in so much that they were all amazed, 
 and glorified God ” —Mark 2:10-12. 
 
 J OHN HOPELESS had been sick with the 
 palsy a long time. He lived in Palestine— 
 a land we have learned to call the Holy Land 
 because Jesus lived there; gave Himself for the 
 sins of the world there, and arose from the dead 
 and ascended into heaven from that land. It was 
 Jesus who made it the Holy Land. But John 
 Hopeless had never heard of Jesus and had given 
 up hope of ever being cured of the dreadful palsy 
 that bound him to his bed by its cruel chains. And 
 then a wonderful thing happened. His next 
 neighbour down the road was nearly as bad off as 
 John was. He had been a cripple for more years 
 than John had suffered with the palsy; yes, James 
 Cheero had been crippled so that he could not walk 
 
 41 
 
42 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 at all save by the aid of a pair of clumsy crutches. 
 But he had always been cheerful and had never 
 given up hope of getting the use of his legs again, 
 though no one else saw any reason for his hope. 
 
 And one day Cheero came dashing into the 
 house of his neighbour Hopeless and shouted, al¬ 
 most out of breath: “ Cheer up, John, you are 
 going to be well yet! ” 
 
 And when he paused to catch his breath, Hope¬ 
 less, in astonishment, cried: “Why, James, where 
 are your crutches? ” 
 
 “ Why, I don’t need them any more! I met the 
 most wonderful Man in the world an hour ago, 
 and He put His hands on my legs and said, ‘ Be 
 thou whole,’ and I felt a strange thrill run through 
 my legs, and I dropped my crutches and walked; 
 and then I was so happy that I leaped, and ran, 
 and shouted for joy! ” 
 
 By this time John Hopeless’ eyes were standing 
 out in amazement, and for a moment a look of 
 hope sprang up in them; but merely for a moment, 
 then he lay back with a weary sigh: “ That shows 
 how much worse off I am than you were. You 
 could get around on crutches, but I have not been 
 away from this place for years, and never will go 
 until they bury me.” 
 
 “ Oh, don’t say that, John, for this wonderful 
 rabbi, Jesus, has stopped just up the road where 
 
TO JESUS THROUGH THE ROOF 43 
 
 an old woman was very bad with a fever, and He 
 went in to heal her, and they are bringing people 
 with all kinds of sickness so fast that He is still 
 in the house, and He heals every one that comes.” 
 
 “ But, James, you did not see Him heal any one 
 who was sick with palsy, did you ? ” 
 
 “ No, John; but I saw Him make a leper look as 
 fresh and clean as a boy by a word and a touch 
 of His hand, and the old blind beggar that used 
 to sit by the roadside can see now as well as you 
 can; and if He can make a blind man see, and a 
 leper clean, He surely can cure a man of palsy.” 
 
 “ But, James, see; it’s just my luck: these peo¬ 
 ple met Him face to face or they never would have 
 been healed; but I cannot get to Him. I am 
 chained here to this bed.” 
 
 “ Well, don’t fret about that,” said Cheero. 
 “ We are going to take you, bed and all.” 
 
 “ But, James, I am too heavy; you know I can¬ 
 not help myself the least bit.” 
 
 “ All we ask you to do is to cheer up.” And 
 Cheero went to the door and cried: ‘‘Come on, 
 boys,” and in a moment in burst the man who for 
 years had sat beside the road, blind and begging, 
 his eyes flashing with interest and his face flushed 
 with joy, crying, “Cheer up, Hopeless; see what 
 Jesus has done for me: two hours ago I was blind 
 as a bat, and now I can see as well as any one. 
 
44 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 Jesus did it, and He will cure you, too.” Then 
 another man stepped alongside: “ And I was a 
 poor homeless leper. My soul! what an awful life 
 I have led, but I met Jesus and He made me clean. 
 See! my flesh is as soft and fresh as any man’s; 
 He will heal you, too.” 
 
 “ But it will take four to carry this bed, and 
 you are only three.” 
 
 But Cheero said, “ I stopped at your brother’s 
 and asked him to help, and he said he would fol¬ 
 low us, and here he is. Now, boys,” said Cheero, 
 “ each man take a corner and we will soon have 
 him at the feet of Jesus.” 
 
 He was a large man and not easy to carry, but 
 the four men, one at each corner of the bed, lifted 
 him from the floor and soon had him on his way. 
 But when they came in sight of the house, they 
 saw a great crowd gathered about the door and 
 a great many other poor sick people lying on the 
 ground outside, waiting, with their friends, greatly 
 excited because every few minutes some one 
 slipped out through the crowd whom Jesus had 
 but just now healed. This was so exciting to 
 those outside, waiting, that they crowded as close 
 as possible to the door, and it was soon evident 
 that the house was full inside, and only as the 
 healed people came out was there any chance for 
 another inside. 
 
TO JESUS THROUGH THE ROOF 45 
 
 Poor John Hopeless! His courage, which had 
 begun to grow, failed him again. “ That’s just 
 my luck; we can never get in to Jesus through 
 that crowd, and He will get weary of healing and 
 go away before my turn comes.” 
 
 Just then James Cheero had a new idea. “ Say, 
 boys, I’ll tell you what we can do: that flat roof 
 is in sections. We will manage some way to get 
 Hopeless up on that roof and open it up, and let 
 him right down before Jesus.” 
 
 Then spoke up the brother of Hopeless: “ I 
 know where there is a ladder. I’ll get it.” And 
 away he ran. 
 
 “ And I know where there is an old tent that is 
 big enough to slip right under this bed, and we can, 
 by holding on to the four corners, which will serve 
 instead of ropes, let the bed down to the floor,” 
 said Cheero, and away he ran as if he had been a 
 contestant in a foot race. 
 
 “ My, when I remember how James Cheero used 
 to hobble around on crutches and now see him run 
 like that, it almost makes me hope I shall be able 
 to walk again, myself,” said Plopeless. 
 
 “ Of course you will,” said the man whose sight 
 had been restored. “ Why, John, it would be no 
 more wonderful for you to carry this bed home 
 on your own back than for me to be standing 
 here, seeing.” 
 
46 WONDERFUL" BIBLE'CONVERSIONS. 
 
 “ Or me to be standing here, a clean, well man,” 
 exclaimed the former leper. 
 
 But now the brother came with the ladder, and 
 Cheero came with the tent, and they carried the 
 bed near the wall of the house; two of them 
 climbed to the roof and took hold of the corners 
 on one side, and in one way and another they 
 finally managed to lift their cumbersome human 
 burden to the roof. It was a simple matter, then, 
 to take out a section. 
 
 I imagine there was a good deal of excitement 
 underneath when the roof opened over their heads, 
 and they saw the men peering down to make sure 
 just where Jesus was. But they were still more 
 excited when the bed started down and seemed to 
 be coming on to their heads, and, in self-defense, 
 they crowded back against each other. Holding 
 the four corners of the tent, the four determined 
 men let Hopeless down at the feet of Jesus in the 
 opening the fearful people in front of the Master 
 had cleared. 
 
 Bring the picture before your imagination. The 
 central figure is Jesus. There He stands, His face 
 full of power and compassion. His eyes are full 
 of tenderness and sympathy. At His feet, lying 
 on his bed, is poor John Hopeless, still trembling 
 with his old enemy, the palsy. He is looking at 
 Jesus. He had never seen a rabbi like this. There 
 
TO JESUS THROUGH THE ROOF 47 
 
 was a nobility about the face of Jesus and a look 
 in His eyes that thrilled him through with hope. 
 It did more than make him hope for healing. It 
 made him feel what a poor, miserable sinner he 
 had been, and was. Down in his heart he felt the 
 divine goodness in the soul of Jesus, and he said 
 to himself: “If I could only be free from my 
 sins against God and be as good as He is, it would 
 be a greater blessing than even to be well again.” 
 About these central figures stood the crowd. Some 
 were cold, sneering Pharisees watching to catch 
 Jesus in a trap, to find some slip in His words 
 whereby they could get Him into trouble; others 
 happily healed and full of reverent gladness, and 
 still others just crowding through the door, seek¬ 
 ing help: all looking eagerly to see w T hat Jesus 
 would do. 
 
 Jesus is not looking at the man on his bed, but 
 His face is lifted to the open roof, where at the 
 four corners of the square opening are the eager 
 faces of the men who have just let the palsied man 
 down at the Master’s feet. From the faces of 
 three of them, at least, the most intent and joyous 
 faith shines forth. Has not Jesus, within a few 
 hours, healed them? One had been a poor, blind 
 man for years. Now his glad eyes are drinking 
 in the goodness and mercy in the face of the Lord. 
 One had been a poor outcast leper, but now outcast 
 
48 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 no more, his flesh soft as a child’s, his beaming 
 countenance showing he has not a doubt of Christ’s 
 power to heal; and Cheero, the man of the 
 crutches, lame no longer, his face radiant with 
 courage that his friend and neighbour is about to 
 be cured. 
 
 Jesus feels their faith, and dropping His eyes 
 to the face of the sick man, says: “ Son, thy sins 
 are forgiven.” Strange, was it not? John Hope¬ 
 less had just been thinking how glorious it would 
 be to be sinless like Jesus, and now the first words 
 Jesus says are, “ Son, thy sins are forgiven thee.” 
 
 But this is just what the Pharisees are watch¬ 
 ing for, and they nod their heads and wink at 
 each other as much as to say, “ We have got Him 
 now. That is a claim to divinity; for no one can 
 forgive sins but God.” And Jesus, knowing per¬ 
 fectly what was in their wicked thoughts, went on 
 saying, “ Why reason ye these things in your 
 hearts? Which is easier, to say to the sick of 
 palsy, Thy sins are forgiven; or to say, Arise, and 
 take up thy bed, and walk ? ” 
 
 And John Hopeless, hopeless no more forever, 
 felt thrilling through and through him not only 
 the new physical strength he had not known for 
 years, but a new sense of joy of soul, a rapture 
 from forgiven sin. He was not only a well man, 
 but he was a free man, a good man, he had peace 
 
TO JESUS THROUGH THE ROOF 49 
 
 with God, and in that happiest hour he had ever 
 known, he arose and took his own bed over his 
 shoulders, and as they crowded back before him 
 in awe and wonder, he made his way through the 
 crowd on his way home. 
 
 Thank God, Jesus still has power on earth to 
 forgive sins! 
 
 Let us not fail to learn the special message of 
 this particular conversion—the wonderful lesson 
 of the effective power of cooperation in bringing 
 people to Christ for their salvation. Only Jesus 
 could forgive his sins and heal his sickness, but 
 the four friends brought him where Christ was 
 and secured his salvation. 
 
 Christ saved Andrew and his friends, but it was 
 John the Baptist who said to them: “ Behold, the 
 Lamb of God, that taketh away the sin of the 
 world! ” Jesus saved them, but John sent them. 
 Jesus saved Peter; but it was Andrew who went 
 and found and brought his brother to Jesus. We 
 may still bring our friends to Jesus for Him to 
 save. 
 
 But let us not stray away from the four men 
 in this story. Is there some one who needs Jesus 
 very much whom you are desirous should be 
 saved ? You have been praying for that one friend 
 or acquaintance especially. Well, how about it? 
 Are you willing to be one of the four to bring 
 
50 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 him quickly to the Saviour? God likes to have 
 us answer our own prayers. Fred Douglass says 
 he prayed to God to set him free from slavery 
 for a long time; but when he actually began to 
 run toward freedom, he got farther away from 
 bondage on his own legs in one minute than he 
 had in a year of praying. We must answer our 
 own prayers when we can. If you are willing to 
 be one, where are you going to look for the other 
 three ? It is well to look close to the man’s home 
 for one or more of them. A father, or mother, 
 or brother, or sister, if they are Christians, will 
 be good helpers. Interest them to help now. If 
 a man is married, and his wife is a genuine Chris¬ 
 tian, no one will be better for one corner. If you 
 still need another, get a new convert, get some 
 man or woman who has recently been healed, who 
 has found Christ in his own salvation. You 
 will not have to argue with them that Christ has 
 power to forgive sins; they know it by the joy of 
 their own souls. No one will lift harder to help 
 against all odds to carry a helpless sinner to the 
 feet of Jesus than a new convert who is all aglow 
 with the new freedom in his own heart. 
 
 Oh! Christ is in the midst, able to save and 
 willing to save. My friend! You who are con¬ 
 scious of your sin, and of your own weakness to 
 overcome it, if you will look in the face of Jesus 
 
TO JESUS THROUGH THE ROOF 51 
 
 as eagerly as John Hopeless did, you will not only 
 find the forgiveness of your sins, but you will re¬ 
 ceive a new consciousness of God-given power to 
 live a new life and a good life, and you will have 
 thrilling you through and through the noble as¬ 
 surance that your manhood is at last fulfilled in 
 Jesus. 
 
 Patrick O’Shea has written a very beautiful 
 little poem of love which I like to spiritualize and 
 use as an expression of my own heart’s experience 
 with Jesus, my Lord: 
 
 When I found you—all nature seemed to call; 
 The silence of the years that crept along 
 Now burst into a madding lyric song, 
 
 The very skies took on a different hue 
 When I found you. 
 
 A little rill that lay within my heart, 
 
 All frozen over with the pain of years, 
 
 Broke from its dam, and like refreshing tears 
 Swept through my being—bringing hope anew 
 When I found you. 
 
 The Pagan “ I ” now stole away in shame, 
 
 The angels seemed to peep from every space 
 And all the sunbeams mirrored your dear face. 
 At last I knew that God sent rain and dew, 
 When I found you. 
 
 And so you brought unto my darkened soul 
 A wondrous light—a knowledge of great things; 
 Then all the evil spirits took to wings 
 And I at last to my own self was true, 
 
 When I found you. 
 
52 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 It may be like that to you if you will find Jesus 
 and let Him find you. All nature and all life will 
 grow radiant, and new impulse and joy will spring 
 up at His magic touch. All the universe will 
 pulsate with the presence of the living, loving God. 
 The evil spirits that have tempted you will take 
 wfing, and to your own best self you will be true 
 if you will find Jesus, your Saviour and your Lord. 
 
IV 
 
 THE CALLING OF MATTHEW LEVI 
 
 “And as he passed by, he saw Levi the son of 
 Alphceus sitting at the place of toll, and he saith unto 
 him, Follow me . And he arose and followed him.” 
 
 —Mark 2: 14. 
 
 “And Levi made him a great feast in his house: 
 and there was a great multitude of publicans and of 
 others that were sitting at meat with them.” 
 
 —Luke 5:29. 
 
 “And as Jesus passed by from thence, he saw a 
 man, called Matthew, sitting at the place of toll: and 
 he saith unto him, Follow me. And he arose, and 
 followed him.”- — Matthew 9 : 9. 
 
 M ATTHEW and Levi are the same man. 
 
 It was not an unusual thing in the early 
 days of Christianity for a man who had 
 been well known under another name, on becom¬ 
 ing a disciple of Christ, to change his name. Thus 
 Simon became Peter, and Saul of Tarsus, the vio¬ 
 lent persecutor, after conversion became Paul, the 
 evangelist and missionary. So Levi, when he shed 
 the old disgraced life of Roman tax-collector, 
 changed his name to Matthew, the gift of God. 
 
 It is very probable that Matthew was a cousin 
 to Jesus, and, if so, had known Jesus all his life. 
 
 S3 
 
 1 
 
54 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 Matthew was the black sheep in his family. He 
 had taken office under the hated Roman govern¬ 
 ment and had become that most despised of all 
 officers, a tax-gatherer. No one ever likes to pay 
 taxes, and the most hateful of all taxes are those 
 a subject people have to pay to foreign despots. 
 
 It was especially galling for the Jews to pay 
 taxes to the Roman tax-collectors, and when one 
 of their own people so forgot his racial and family 
 honour as to become the customs officer of this 
 hated Roman government, he was looked upon as 
 a renegade and a traitor. He became largely an 
 outcast from society. They would not even ac¬ 
 cept his evidence in a court of justice. This hatred 
 was carried so far, and this ostracism was so 
 bitter, that it grew to be a proverb, if you wished 
 to describe some one entirely outside the pale of 
 possible fellowship, “ Let him be unto thee as a 
 heathen man and a publican.” Levi was a publi¬ 
 can—no wonder that, when he gave up his office 
 and his despicable business to follow Christ as 
 His disciple, he threw away the old name and be¬ 
 came Matthew, the gift of God. 
 
 It is quite likely that Jesus was the only one in 
 the family who had not cast Matthew off. But 
 you cannot imagine Jesus refusing to speak to His 
 cousin because he earned his living differently from 
 the rest of the family, and Jesus longed to win 
 
THE CALLING OF MATTHEW 
 
 55 
 
 Matthew to His service, to be a preacher of the 
 good news of salvation. So one day, as He was 
 passing by his place of business at the Custom 
 House, He went in and had a frank personal talk 
 with Matthew and offered to take him as one of 
 His special disciples. 
 
 Matthew seems to have yielded at once to 
 Christ’s invitation. He had no doubt kept track 
 of the growing fame of Jesus. It is quite likely 
 that the conversion of the man who was let down 
 through the roof had had a good deal to do with 
 Matthew’s decision that Jesus was the Christ. 
 Great stress had been laid on the forgiveness of 
 sins in that case of healing, which had probably 
 taken place not far from Matthew’s place of busi¬ 
 ness. In any event, he had come to believe on 
 Jesus and probably had wished that he might be¬ 
 come one of His disciples, and was ready with 
 quick response when Jesus came and invited him 
 to follow Him. 
 
 He did not dally. His resignation went in at 
 once. I can imagine how he went home and said: 
 “ Mary, I have wonderful news for you! ” 
 
 “ Why, what has happened ? ” 
 
 “ I had a call from Jesus to-day.” 
 
 “ You did! What did He want ? ” 
 
 “ He invited me to give up this tax business and 
 become one of His disciples.” 
 
56 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 “ Oh, Levi, I wish you would! Jesus is so good 
 and noble, one can seem to see heaven in His 
 glorious face! ” 
 
 “ Well, Mary, I thought that would please you, 
 and I have accepted. I took Jesus up at once. 
 I just wrote my resignation to the governor and 
 locked my desk. I am done with it forever, and, 
 Mary, if you don’t mind, I wish you would never 
 call me Levi again. Suppose you call me 
 Matthew: that means, the gift of Cod. And I 
 feel that this call of Jesus brings me very close to 
 God and His love. I want to be done with the 
 old life, and really become a new man in fellow¬ 
 ship with Jesus.” 
 
 iS Oh, I am so happy,” exclaimed Mary. “ I 
 will love to call you Matthew, and help you all I 
 can. Say, dear, wouldn’t it be a good thing to 
 give a farewell dinner to all your old friends among 
 the tax-collectors and have Jesus and His other 
 disciples present. That would give you a good 
 chance to introduce them all to Jesus. I do not 
 see how any one could meet Jesus socially and not 
 love Him, and I do not doubt that many of them 
 will become His friends if they have opportunity 
 to talk with Him.” 
 
 “ That would be fine for us, and fine for the 
 other publicans; but the Pharisees hate us so, and 
 we are so unpopular socially, Jesus might think it 
 
THE CALLING OF MATTHEW 
 
 57 
 
 unwise to come to a dinner where all the guests 
 were so despised,” said Matthew. 
 
 But Mary shook her head and said; “No, 
 Matthew, dear, Jesus would never look at it that 
 way. If any one is unpopular, Jesus seems all the 
 more interested in him. He never seeks after the 
 rich or powerful people, but if any one, is very 
 lonely, or is disgraced, or in trouble, or sick, Jesus 
 is sure to be hunting after him. I am sure He 
 would never stay away from our dinner because 
 the guests were all sinners. They seem to be the 
 very people He is most desirous to meet.” 
 
 “ Mary, I am glad you thought about giving a 
 dinner. I never would have thought of that. My! 
 It is wonderful to have a wife like you. You are 
 always thinking of just the right thing at the right 
 time to help me.” 
 
 “ Matthew, that is a wife’s part, to think how 
 to make our social life a help and a blessing, and 
 if Jesus meets these friends of yours at dinner, 
 it will give Him a great opportunity to win their 
 friendship. And, dear, have you thought how it 
 will establish you before all the world as an open 
 friend of Jesus? ” 
 
 “ No,” replied Matthew, “ I had not thought of 
 that, but I am willing for all the world to know 
 it.” 
 
 “ I know you are, husband; and there is no 
 
58 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 better way than this dinner. Jesus will be the 
 honour guest at our dinner, and His disciples will 
 be with Him, and you will announce to them all 
 that you, too, have become His disciple, and have 
 given up all else for that. It will save you from 
 any temptation to waver or ever turn back. Oh, 
 I am so glad you are willing to have the dinner. 
 I love Jesus and I love to do Him honour, and it 
 makes me so happy to have you and Jesus friends, 
 the two I love best in all the world. Surely this 
 is a new and precious epoch we are entering, with 
 Jesus at the head of our table and our chief friend 
 and Lord.” And so it was a very happy night 
 in the house of Matthew. 
 
 Matthew’s wife was right about it. Jesus never 
 hesitated a moment about accepting Matthew’s 
 invitation because most of the guests were publi¬ 
 cans and sinners. 
 
 But Matthew was right about it stirring up a 
 good deal of criticism in the community. Matthew 
 and his wife carried their plan through, and in¬ 
 vited as guests at the dinner they gave to Jesus 
 those who had shared in Matthew’s shame and 
 disrepute as agents of the Roman government. It 
 shows how genuinely sincere Matthew was in his 
 repentance and confession of Christ, that he made 
 his dinner to the Saviour a really “ great feast,” 
 and filled it with his fellow sinners in an effort 
 
THE CALLING OF MATTHEW 
 
 59 
 
 to bring them in touch with the Lord whom he had 
 determined henceforth to follow. Having found 
 forgiveness of his sins, he longed to bring like 
 pardon to his former associates. As these men 
 had shared in his shame, he now did his best to 
 give them a chance to share in his honour and joy. 
 
 But as soon as the dinner was heralded about, 
 the Pharisees began to cry out, “ How is it that 
 he eateth with publicans and sinners ? ” 
 
 But Jesus had His answer ready. “ They that 
 are whole have no need of a physician, but they 
 that are sick: I came not to call the righteous, but 
 sinners.” And so Jesus seized a criticism and 
 made it the keynote of His Gospel. And Chris¬ 
 tianity is never so successful in doing the full work 
 of Christ among men as when it is striking that 
 note loud and clear. Jesus came to seek and to 
 save the lost. He came to seek sinners and to 
 save them from their sins, and when the Church 
 is hot on the trail of the sinner, it is doing its 
 noblest work in building up noble Christian char¬ 
 acter. And whenever the Church loses the evan¬ 
 gelistic note and makes the chief mission of the 
 Church the culture of a high sainthood among its 
 members, it begins to lose its power to produce 
 saints. It is when in the spirit of Christ we for¬ 
 get ourselves in our anxiety for the salvation of 
 sinners, that Christ is able to develop most clearly 
 
60 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 His blessed image in us. The Church of Jesus 
 exists not to coddle saints, but to collar sinners; 
 and when we live in that spirit, the Church thrives, 
 and not only has power to win sinners, but culti¬ 
 vate saints. Think of any great triumphant epoch 
 of Christianity and you will note the truth of this 
 statement. During all the years of Paul's mission¬ 
 ary travels, while he was spreading the fame of 
 Jesus to the ends of the known world, and de¬ 
 veloping the highest moral character among the 
 people to whom he ministered as well as in his 
 own mind and heart, the great cry of his soul 
 everywhere was, “ Believe on the Lord Jesus, and 
 thou shalt be saved." In the days of the Wesleys 
 and Whitefield, and the building up of early 
 Methodism, it was the same note that was struck 
 constantly. John Wesley was the great outdoor 
 preacher, not only in the woods, but in the stone- 
 quarries and in the streets. Wherever sinful men 
 and women could be gathered together to hear, he 
 was ready to cry out the message of Christ as the 
 Saviour of sinners. Let us never forget that the 
 college, and the university, and the Christian hos¬ 
 pital, and the library, and all the glorious blessings 
 that attend Christian civilization are, after all, 
 aftermath, the result of the preaching of Christ 
 as the Saviour of lost sinners. It is the Church 
 that is on fire with Christ’s longing to save sinners 
 
THE CALLING OF MATTHEW 
 
 61 
 
 that is ready to sacrifice to build all those institu¬ 
 tions of culture and mercy, which can conserve, 
 but never produce, the glorious results of Chris¬ 
 tian evangelism. Christian missions also are the 
 fruit of a soul-saving Christianity at home. 
 
 Not only is this true, but all these fortresses of 
 Christianity in missions, and hospitals, and col¬ 
 leges should hold it to be their supreme purpose to 
 honour and glorify the Christ in whose teaching 
 and sacrifice they had their birth and reason for 
 existence. The Christian college must be a furnace 
 of loyalty to Christ, the Saviour of sinners. The 
 Christian hospital, the hotel of God, should breathe 
 always the spirit of Him who said to the man who 
 was sick of the palsy, “ But that ye may know 
 that the Son of man hath authority on earth to for¬ 
 give sins, I say unto thee, Arise, take up thy bed, 
 and go unto thy house.” 
 
 There is another thought about this dinner 
 Matthew gave to Jesus: It brought holy associa¬ 
 tions into his home. It was a sort of dedication 
 of his home to the service of Christ. All our 
 homes should be dedicated to the service of Christ. 
 I have never seen any way of doing this so beau¬ 
 tiful in its influence on the entire family and so 
 sweet in its fragrant memories afterward as the 
 old-fashioned family altar, when father and 
 mother and children every day invite Jesus to a 
 
62 WONDERFUL BIBLE" CONVERSIONS 
 
 fellowship of song and Bible reading and prayer 
 together at the home altar. Children brought up 
 in a home like that are bound to Christ by tender 
 memories that weave all the sacred and holy loves 
 of childhood into their religious faith. No gold 
 mines of earth are rich enough to buy from me 
 the memories of the family altar in front of an 
 old stone fireplace in a log cabin that has been 
 dust and ashes for many a long year. 
 
 Some who have read the foregoing paragraphs 
 should find in the story of Matthew’s dinner sug¬ 
 gestions which may open the door to rich bless¬ 
 ings to your own soul. Jesus has been present. 
 As you have been reading, He has paused by your 
 side and looked deep into your eyes. Fie has been 
 saying to you, quietly and tenderly, “ Follow Me! ” 
 Will you follow Matthew’s example here and now? 
 Matthew seized his opportunity promptly. He did 
 not wait; he did not argue; he did not parley or 
 dally—he arose at once and followed Jesus, out 
 of disgrace and dishonour into a worthy Christian 
 life. He made his acceptance of Christ’s invita¬ 
 tion just as definite and certain as possible. He 
 made a public dinner to Jesus and burned all his 
 bridges behind him. He introduced Jesus to every 
 friend he had. 
 
 Will you follow his example? Some of your 
 friends are greatly influenced by you; not only your 
 
THE CALLING OF MATTHEW 
 
 63 
 
 own salvation, but theirs, hangs on the balance. 
 If you will obey Christ and openly confess Him 
 now, you will turn the scale for them in favour of 
 Jesus. It will be a blessed thing to make your 
 coming not only joyous to your own heart, but a 
 joy-bringer to the homes of your friends. Rise 
 up and follow Jesus now! 
 
V 
 
 THE NIGHT JESUS SPENT WITH 
 ZACCH/EUS OF JERICHO 
 
 " And Jesus said unto him , To-day is salvation 
 tome to this house, forasmuch as he also is a son of 
 Abraham. For the Son of man came to seek and to 
 save that which was lost .”— Luke 19 : 9 - 10 . 
 
 Z ACCHZEUS was the chief internal reve¬ 
 nue collector in the important city of 
 Jericho. He had made a lot of money, 
 and had become a very rich man as tax-collector 
 for the despised Roman government. But there 
 was good stuff in Zacchaeus; he had a good mind 
 and really desired to be a much better man than 
 he was. A tax-collector in Jericho at that day was 
 in a hard place. On one side the unscrupulous 
 and corrupt Roman governors were out to make 
 all the money they could, and on the other side the 
 equally unscrupulous and shrewd Jewish merchants 
 were scheming to pay as little as possible to a 
 government they hated and counted it a virtue to 
 cheat. There was almost unlimited opportunity 
 for graft for a smart, tactful collector, and a very 
 
 dangerous berth for one who tried to be honest. 
 
 64 
 
WITH ZACCHiEUS OF JEKICHO 65 
 
 Zacchseus had evidently been tactful and had be¬ 
 come a rich man. 
 
 Now Zacchseus, when news reached his office 
 that Jesus of Nazareth was coming up the road on 
 His way to Jerusalem, was very much interested 
 and even excited. He had heard a good deal about 
 Jesus. Some time before another tax-collector in 
 Jerusalem had given a big dinner to Jesus and 
 had become one of His disciples. This man, Levi, 
 who from the day of the beginning of his disciple- 
 ship to Christ had called himself Matthew, had 
 been a well-known collector, and Zacchseus had 
 been acquainted with some other publicans or col¬ 
 lectors who had attended that dinner. Some of 
 the reports that had come to him from these 
 friends had greatly interested him, and had made 
 him determined to see Jesus himself, if the op¬ 
 portunity ever came his way; so Zacchseus locked 
 up his desk and went out into the street where the 
 crowd was already gathering to see Jesus. There 
 was a great deal of excitement in the town over 
 news which had just come in that morning, that 
 a very well-known blind beggar, an interesting 
 character named Bartimseus, known to Zacchseus 
 and many others in Jericho, had practically held 
 up the procession as Jesus was passing by, and 
 had been healed, and could now see as well as any 
 one, and who, because of his great joy over receive 
 
66 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 ing his sight, was accompanying Jesus and His 
 party and attracting nearly as much attention as 
 Jesus Himself. All these things working together 
 gave Zacchaeus an irresistible desire to see Christ. 
 
 Now, in a crowd, Zacchaeus was at a great dis¬ 
 advantage. He had inherited from his ancestry a 
 pair of very short legs, and the average crowd was 
 so much taller than he, that he did not stand much 
 chance of getting to see Christ. But Zacchaeus 
 had been a little man all his life, and had learned 
 a good many ways of overcoming this handicap, 
 and noticing a sycamore tree with wide-spreading 
 branches standing near where Jesus would have to 
 pass as He came into town, he quickly climbed up, 
 and soon was in a position where he could see 
 Christ better than the tallest man in the crowd. 
 So, when Jesus came, Zacchaeus had an unob¬ 
 structed view. First coming on ahead was a group 
 led by Bartimaeus. He was very happy, and to 
 every one of his acquaintances he would cry out: 
 “ See what has happened to me! Jesus of Naza¬ 
 reth did it! Why, He not only opened my eyes, 
 but He has forgiven my sins. I feel like a new 
 man. I just want to thank God all the time. Oh, 
 friends, I believe Jesus is the Messiah, the Christ 
 foretold by the prophets; surely no one else 
 could work such miracles as He has wrought on 
 
WITH ZACCHiEUS OF JERICHO 67 
 
 All this excited Zacchaeus more and more. 
 Down in his soul Zacchaeus was greatly dissatis¬ 
 fied with himself. He was very unpopular with 
 many people in the town because of his business, 
 but he was more unpopular with himself than with 
 any one else. He knew his life was not right in 
 the sight of God; but he had gotten into an evil 
 tangle, and his life was all a wicked snarl, and 
 he did not know how to unravel it. As he 
 listened to Bartimaeus, whom he remembered well 
 as a sad old beggar, and saw how happy he was 
 now, and heard his shouts of praise to God and 
 his thanks to Jesus for his sight and for the for¬ 
 giveness of his sins, down deep in his wretched 
 heart Zacchaeus said to himself: “Oh, if Jesus 
 would only take my affairs in hand and unravel 
 and straighten out this sad mess I have made of 
 my life, and forgive my sins! Oh, if I could only 
 be as happy as Bartimaeus, I would gladly give 
 up all my money.” 
 
 And then Jesus came, with His disciples, and 
 the crowd following, and Zacchaeus had no eyes 
 for any one save Jesus. What a man Jesus was 
 to him! It seemed to Zacchaeus he had never seen 
 a real man before. Such a face! So full of 
 strength, mingled with gentleness! All power and 
 wisdom seemed to be there, and yet surmounting 
 them pity and love seemed to rule. Before 
 
68 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 Zacchaeus had climbed into the tree his great fear 
 had been that he would not get to see Jesus; now 
 his great anxiety was that Jesus would not see 
 him—he felt that he could not endure having 
 Christ pass on without seeing him; and just then 
 Christ lifted that wonderful face and their eyes 
 met, and each gazed deep into the eyes of the 
 other. In that moment Zacchaeus was possessed 
 with a desire to open his heart to Christ and tell 
 Him all his troubles and do whatever Jesus said 
 he ought to do. Jesus, looking into Zacchaeus , 
 soul, loved him. Once before He had looked into 
 eyes full of that same hunger and failed to save 
 the man He loved. 
 
 Men in whom Jesus is greatly interested, and 
 whom He loves and seeks with all the energy of 
 His divine nature to bless and save, do not al¬ 
 ways yield to His entreaties. When Jesus was 
 here among men, men met Him and looked into 
 His glorious eyes, and Jesus loved them; and some 
 were saved, but some failed of salvation. Do you 
 remember the young man, very rich, and high in 
 place and power, who met Jesus joyfully? He had 
 no doubt been listening to Jesus at one of His 
 meetings, and had a great, overpowering emotion 
 suddenly welling up in his soul to be one of Christ’s 
 near friends and disciples, and came running to 
 Christ, as He was going away, and said: “ Good 
 
WITH ZACCHiEUS OF JERICHO 69 
 
 Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?” 
 He was full of enthusiasm; his face was all aglow 
 with his gallant desire to lead some heroic crusade 
 by which he might win the great prize of eternal 
 life. 
 
 But Jesus threw him back on the old ten com¬ 
 mandments and he was disappointed and said: 
 “ All these things have I observed from my youth 
 up.” He was a fine, clean, wholesome, upstanding 
 young man, and the writer says, “ Jesus loved 
 him.” And the Saviour made a dead set for his 
 soul. He saw the weak spot of self-indulgence, 
 his love for riches, and He looked deep into his 
 eyes with infinite love and said: “ One thing thou 
 lackest yet: sell all that thou hast, and distribute 
 unto the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in 
 heaven: and come, follow me.” Think what a 
 chance he had! Jesus was willing to take him on 
 as one of the immortals whose names and whose 
 usefulness will live forever! He offered him a 
 chance to share the glory of Peter and John for¬ 
 ever ! But he went away sad, with a cloud on his 
 brow. 
 
 Some of you may be saying in your hearts, “ If 
 I could have stood in the presence of Jesus as he 
 did, I would have yielded.” But I do not know. 
 
 Edwin Markham published, in a recent number 
 of Hearsfs International Magazine, a little poem 
 
70 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 entitled, “ The Man from the Cross,” in which he 
 voices that same faith: 
 
 ‘ What would you do if suddenly there at the door 
 
 Shakespeare should enter the room, the world’s 
 great lover? ” 
 
 Need I to answer? The moment he stept on the 
 floor 
 
 We would rise and uncover! 
 
 %i But what would you do if Another still greater 
 came. 
 
 He who has scars on His hands, the Truth’s de¬ 
 fender? ” 
 
 All hearts would thrill, would flash to a single 
 flame: 
 
 We would kneel and surrender! 
 
 But can you be sure you would surrender, if 
 you will not yield to Him now? See how the 
 great Jewish race as a race turned from Him! 
 
 In the same magazine where Markham voiced 
 this faith, James Oppenheim, a Jewish writer, in 
 the next number, this tragic fact laments: 
 
 Ho! the mightiest of our young men was born 
 under a star in the midwinter. 
 
 His name is written on the sun and it is frosted 
 on the moon. . . * 
 
 Earth breathes him like an eternal spring; he is 
 a second sky over the earth. 
 
 j Ho! we have turned against the mightiest of our 
 young men 
 
 And in that denial we have taken on the Christ, 
 
 1 And the two thieves beside the Christ, 
 
WITH ZACCH2EUS OF JERICHO 71 
 
 And the Magdalen at the feet of the Christ, 
 
 And the Judas with thirty silver pieces selling the 
 Christ, 
 
 And our twenty centuries in Europe have the shape 
 of a Cross. * » . 
 
 May not the same tragedy overtake you! To¬ 
 day Christ stands before you as He did before that 
 rich young ruler, as He did before the great Jew¬ 
 ish race. They failed. God forbid that you shall 
 fail also. Forgiveness, salvation, eternal life are 
 within your reach. For your soul’s sake, do not 
 fail! 
 
 Christ, looking deep into the eyes of Zacchaeus, 
 saw the hunger of his soul and determined to re¬ 
 lieve it. I think there is something very significant 
 in the word Jesus uses to show the compelling 
 force of His feeling, as He says: “ Zacchaeus, 
 make haste, and come down; for to-day I must 
 abide at thy house.*’ 
 
 It was not “ I would like to go home and talk 
 with you; ” or, “ if you would be pleased to have 
 me, I will go.” It is more compelling than any¬ 
 thing like that. A soul, a family, a home is at 
 stake, and Jesus says “ I must abide at thy house.” 
 And Zacchaeus felt the same way, and he made 
 haste and came down and received Jesus joyfully. 
 
 Dwight L. Moody, the greatest expert in soul¬ 
 winning in his day, said that right there, between 
 the limb of that sycamore tree and the ground. 
 
72 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 Zacchseus was converted; and that was the source 
 of the joy he was able to put into his reception of 
 Jesus when he reached the ground. Certain it is 
 that no other experience known to man gives such 
 noble and exquisite joy as the consciousness that 
 one's sins are forgiven and that the soul is ac¬ 
 cepted by the Saviour, unless it is the twin joy of 
 realizing that we have led another soul into the 
 light of salvation. Those who have known the 
 gladness of meeting Jesus in their own soul's ac¬ 
 ceptance, know something of the relief and infinite 
 peace which was at the heart of the joy with which 
 Zacchseus led Christ to his home that day in 
 Jericho. 
 
 It did not matter to Zacchseus or to Jesus that 
 the self-righteous critics cast sour looks at their 
 backs as they walked down the street toward 
 Zacchseus’ house, saying, “ He is gone in to lodge 
 with a man that is a sinner." Zacchseus was the 
 very man Jesus came to save. He was a man who 
 had lost the way and whose affairs were in a 
 tangle and who longed for goodness and knew 
 not how to acquire it; so Jesus went home with 
 him to “ seek and to save that which was lost.” 
 
 It was a great day in the house of Zacchseus. 
 As soon as they were in the house, and Zacchseus 
 had introduced his family, he at once, before he 
 would sit down in Christ's presence, made a full 
 
WITH ZACCH2EUS OF JERICHO 73 
 
 and complete confession. He struck no false note. 
 He went down to bedrock facts. He stood before 
 Christ and said: “Behold, Lord, the half of my 
 goods I give to the poor; and if I have wrongfully 
 exacted aught of any man, I restore fourfold.” 
 It was an honest confession. Jesus, who knew 
 what was in man, knew that it was from the 
 depths of his soul, and He accepted it at par value. 
 Jesus said to him: “To-day is salvation come to 
 this house, forasmuch as he also is a son of Abra¬ 
 ham. For the Son of man came to seek and to 
 save that which was lost.” 
 
 What did Jesus mean by the expression “ son of 
 Abraham” as applied to Zacchaeus? We may be 
 sure it was in no narrow racial sense. He was a 
 son of Abraham in the fact that he had faith in 
 God and repented of his sin and sought to do 
 right. 
 
 There is a great suggestion in this confession of 
 Zacchaeus that may be of vital importance to some 
 of you. I refer to his declaration that if he has 
 wrongfully exacted aught from any man, he will 
 make it right to the last limit of his ability. 
 
 There are many men and many women who will 
 never find forgiveness for their sins and never 
 know the joy that came to Zacchaeus until they 
 have made honest restoration of ill-gotten gains. 
 God will be no party to giving peace to a sinful 
 
74 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 soul who intends to cheat his way into salvation. 
 Absolute honesty is essential to your salvation, 
 and if you have wronged any one and it is pos¬ 
 sible for you to make it right, Christ will not, can¬ 
 not, accept your repentance until you have made 
 restoration to the best of your ability. 
 
 I have known a great many cases like that, and 
 when restoration was made, peace flowed like a 
 river into the soul of the one making it. My 
 friends, if you have wronged any one by word or 
 deed, financially or otherwise, do not delay to make 
 it right to the last limit of your power, and God 
 will not only receive your repentance and forgive 
 your sins, but He will pour out upon you a bless¬ 
 ing so rich in joy that not only your own soul, but 
 all your household, will overflow with the blessed 
 visitation of the divine and loving Christ to your 
 heart and home. 
 
VI 
 
 THE PRODIGAL SON AND HIS ELDER 
 
 BROTHER 
 
 A SERMON FOR MEN ONLY 
 
 “l will arise and go to my father ”— Luke 15: 18. 
 
 S OMEWHERE in the Valley of the World 
 a father lived with his two sons, Prodigal 
 and Selfishness. They lived on a great 
 plantation, in a splendid mansion home, set in the 
 midst of a garden of rare flowers and beautiful 
 fountains, surrounded by orchards of delicious 
 fruits, bordering on wide-reaching and fertile 
 grain fields which, in turn, touched hands with 
 vast and rolling pastures, well watered with 
 springs and flowing streams, along the banks of 
 which herds of cattle and sheep and goats grew 
 and flourished and fattened for the market. 
 
 The father was a noble character, whose broad 
 mind and generous heart brought him the love and 
 devotion of an army of servants who cared for 
 the home and the plantation, as well as the reverent 
 and affectionate regard of the neighbours far and 
 near, so that for many miles in every direction he 
 was known as the Father of the Valley. 
 
 75 
 
76 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 The father, though a good neighbour and a 
 good citizen, gave himself above all else to his 
 duties as a father. His heart centered in his two 
 sons, Prodigal and Selfishness. The names, as I 
 have given them, reverse the order of their birth, 
 for Selfishness was the elder of the two. But 
 Prodigal, being the baby of the family, was long 
 of first importance; besides, this is peculiarly his 
 Story. 
 
 The mother of the boys died when Prodigal was 
 born. She went bravely down into the valley and 
 shadow of death after her second boy, as every 
 mother does after her child, and though she found 
 him and gave him life, she could not come back 
 with him. 
 
 The noble father courageously took up the dou¬ 
 ble burden and faithfully sought to be both father 
 and mother to his motherless sons. He devoted 
 all the strength of his fine mind and kind heart 
 as well as all his resources of every kind to the 
 bringing up of his sons to be good and worthy 
 men. 
 
 Parents who have brought up a family of chil¬ 
 dren, and teachers who have seriously and faith¬ 
 fully dealt with the development of childhood, 
 know well that just as you never see two human 
 faces exactly alike, so every boy or girl is a sepa¬ 
 rate study in personality, with their individual 
 
THE PBODXGAL SON 
 
 77 
 
 problems to present to parent or teacher. So it 
 proved at the old home plantation in the Valley of 
 the World. Father had his hands full with those 
 two boys. Never were two children born of one 
 pair of parents more unlike than were Selfish¬ 
 ness and Prodigal. 
 
 Selfishness, the elder brother, was one of those 
 mature young fellows who never seemed to be a 
 boy. He was old-mannish while still a boy in 
 years. He was a serious-minded youth and very 
 regular in his habits. He was never known to 
 waste anything. While he was still a boy he very 
 carefully laid away and kept all his things. He 
 was given toys like other boys, and though he 
 never cared for them much and seldom played, 
 when he was a grown man he had all his toys and 
 all his boyhood belongings. He did not keep them 
 because he expected to use them or get any pleas¬ 
 ure out of them, but because he was so constructed 
 that he never gave anything away. No one about 
 the place could remember that Selfishness had ever 
 in his life given any one anything save a frown or 
 a rebuke. He was very unpopular with the serv¬ 
 ants, and very early became a grief to his father 
 because of his cold, calculating disposition. 
 
 Prodigal went to the other extreme. When 
 he was a small boy, he was all jollity and mirth 
 and love. He filled his father’s heart with un- 
 
78 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 mixed gladness. All the servants loved him. And 
 while he was very small, if he did not interfere 
 with his own methodical habits, even Selfishness 
 had, sometimes, been known to unbend into smiles 
 at his antics, but never enough to give him any 
 of his own belongings; and as Prodigal grew older, 
 Selfishness came to regard him as an unmitigated 
 nuisance. 
 
 As Prodigal grew older his wild, ungovemed 
 impulses, which had been overlooked or forgiven 
 because of his youth, continually got him into trou¬ 
 ble and brought grief to his father. If the mother 
 had lived, it might have been that her gentle sway 
 would have been able to keep the confidence of 
 her baby boy up into manhood, and to have held 
 him back from the perils which ere long beset 
 his unwary feet. As it was, he soon got away 
 from his father’s guidance. The father loved him 
 always, was ever kind and generous, but the boy 
 grew more self-willed and more indifferent to the 
 grief his wasteful and ungoverned life brought to 
 the great-hearted father. 
 
 This estrangement grew rapidly as he began to 
 make friends, not with the best, but with the most 
 thoughtless and least profitable of the young peo¬ 
 ple of the neighbourhood, both among the young 
 men and young women. He was very popular 
 with this class. His great virility, his gay spirits, 
 
THE PRODIGAL SON 
 
 79 
 
 his really generous disposition, together with the 
 fact that he had a good deal of money at his dis¬ 
 posal, caused him not only to be petted and flat¬ 
 tered by the younger and gayer set, but to be much 
 sought after by some designing people who hoped 
 to fatten on what he wasted in his folly. 
 
 The good father sought to do his duty by the 
 son he loved with all his heart. He reasoned with 
 him, pointed out the dangers that lay ahead in his 
 path; but Prodigal was young and self-willed, and 
 thought his father was old-fashioned and did not 
 understand how things had changed since he was 
 a boy, so he grew still farther and farther away 
 from his noble father, who often wept and prayed 
 until late at night for his wayward, but beloved, 
 son. 
 
 Selfishness, instead of doing what he could to 
 keep Prodigal contented at home, only widened 
 the breach by his continual nagging at his brother’s 
 folly, until at last Prodigal determined to get away 
 from all parental restraint and out of reach of his 
 elder brother’s faultfinding. 
 
 So one day, after a night of dissipation which 
 had brought a patiently tender, but earnest, rebuke 
 from the long-suffering father, Prodigal said: 
 “ Father, give me the portion of thy substance that 
 falleth to me.” 
 
 The father was deeply grieved and hurt, but 
 
SO WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 after reflection and prayer came to the conclusion 
 that nothing but the hard experiences of life would 
 ever bring Prodigal to his senses. The sons, of 
 course, could not legally take their portion mitil 
 the father’s death, except by his free gift. Under 
 the Jewish custom, Prodigal, as the younger son, 
 would be entitled to one-third and Selfishness to 
 two-thirds of the estate. So this great-souled fa¬ 
 ther made an estimate and divided the property 
 so that Prodigal could be at liberty to take his 
 portion. It seems to have been given him in per¬ 
 sonal property, for the Saviour says that not many 
 days after the first conversation Prodigal “ gath¬ 
 ered all together and took his journey into a far 
 country.” 
 
 Selfishness, the elder brother, could hardly re¬ 
 strain his secret delight in getting rid of Prodigal. 
 His own supreme desire was to get money, and so 
 long as Prodigal remained at home with his ex¬ 
 pensive and wasteful habits, with the property 
 undivided, he stood a chance to lose a part of his 
 own prospective inheritance. So he was greatly 
 pleased when Prodigal took his departure. 
 
 But it was a sad day for the father. To him 
 Prodigal was still his baby, the last gift of his 
 beloved wife, and only the hope that the hard ex¬ 
 periences in the Far Country would teach lessons 
 of wisdom and send his favourite son back to his 
 
THE PRODIGAL SON 
 
 81 
 
 loving arms sustained him. After Prodigal had 
 disappeared from sight in the distance, he went to 
 the secret chamber of his house to plead with God 
 to watch over him and in His own good time to 
 bring him back to him again. 
 
 Prodigal had already made some friends in the 
 Far Country. He had met them at occasional 
 parties among the fast set in the nearest big town 
 to his farm home, and had been greatly taken with 
 them. They never seemed to be troubled with 
 any conscientious scruples. They drank strong 
 liquors without compunction, gambled recklessly, 
 and the girls were not so prudish or overly modest 
 as the girls among his farmer neighbours. All 
 these visitors from the Far Country seemed to 
 think of was having a good time, and their idea of 
 having a good time seemed to be to throw them¬ 
 selves thoughtlessly into the carrying out of any 
 giddy idea that entered their minds, without stop¬ 
 ping to ask any sober questions about right and 
 wrong. Indeed, they ridiculed the very idea that 
 some things were right and others were wrong. 
 These gay travelers had assured Prodigal that if 
 he would only move to the Far Country, his good 
 looks and fine figure and money would put him 
 at the forefront of the gay set, and he would have 
 the time of his life. So it was with high hopes 
 of endless pleasure and gayety and an escape from 
 
82 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 all the sober and borish questions concerning 
 morals and religion, that Prodigal drove his 
 chariot toward the Far Country. 
 
 At last he reached the gayest city in the Far 
 Country. He had come well equipped with the 
 best chariot and the best horses that the country 
 afforded, but he soon saw that his city acquaint¬ 
 ances thought he looked quite shabby for the city, 
 and as he was an easy spender they introduced him 
 to a fashionable inn, and helped him to acquire a 
 turnout and clothing that marked him as one of 
 the swells and gay bloods of the city. He scat¬ 
 tered his money recklessly, thinking he must make 
 an impression, and soon the news spread abroad 
 among the frothiest and fastest outer fringes of 
 society in the most reckless city of even the Far 
 Country, that a green duckling was here to be 
 plucked. 
 
 His father’s cleanly life, and his brother’s ab¬ 
 stinence from all sorts of pleasures that cost 
 money, had restrained him at home; but now the 
 leash was off, and he drank recklessly of the wine 
 that gives its colour to the cup, which at last bites 
 like a serpent and stings like an adder. The drink¬ 
 ing soon led him into the fascinations of games 
 of chance, and from drinking and gambling it was 
 an easy step to the lure and entanglement with 
 wicked women. A good woman is a young man’s 
 
THE PBODIGAL SON 
 
 83 
 
 best friend; but a bad woman is his worst enemy. 
 The Bible does not exaggerate in the least when 
 it says of a bad woman that “ her house takes hold 
 on hell.” 
 
 Prodigal had up to this time lived a clean life, 
 so far as women were concerned; but he had heard 
 stories among the gay drinkers and gamblers, with 
 whom he had become hail-fellow-well-met, that 
 stirred his blood and made him feel that he was 
 quite behind the times. So he, fired with strong 
 drink, was quite ready for that third degree in sin 
 which marks a man as well entered in the race for 
 ruin. If the writer of the book of Proverbs had 
 been there one night he would have seen Prod- 
 igal— 
 
 “ Passing through the street near her comer; 
 
 And he went the way to her house, 
 
 In the twilight, in the evening of the day, 
 
 In the middle of the night and in the darkness. 
 
 And, behold, there met him a woman 
 
 With the attire of a harlot, and wily of heart. 
 
 “ So she caught him, and kissed him, . . . 
 
 With her much fair speech she causeth him to 
 yield; 
 
 With the flattering of her lips she forceth him 
 along. 
 
 He goeth after her straightway 
 
 As an ox goeth to the slaughter . „ . 
 
 Till an arrow strike through his liver; 
 
 As a bird hasteth to the snare, 
 
 And knoweth not that it is for his life.” 
 
84 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 So Prodigal went the broad way that leads to 
 perdition. All that saved him was that his money 
 ran out. He had money enough to have gone the 
 pace at home all his life, but the more expensive 
 vices of the city scattered his store to the four; 
 winds, and it was not long until he got to the 
 bottom and realized that a fool and his money 
 had soon parted, and that he had spent his all— 
 and, when it was all gone and he could no longer 
 pay for the revelry, the friends he had made in 
 the Far Country deserted him as quickly as rats 
 will flee from a sinking ship. Friends made in 
 the ways of vice never stand by in adversity. 
 
 It is interesting to note that when he had got 
 down to the bottom and had nothing left, he began 
 to think of the farm again. He did not think 
 of going back to his old home yet, but just to get 
 away from the city and get out under the sky in 
 God’s open air again. The city that had brought 
 him so near to hell and utter ruin, oh, how he 
 loathed it! 
 
 Notice what Jesus says: “And when he had 
 spent all, there arose a mighty famine in that coun¬ 
 try; and he began to be in want. And he went 
 and joined himself to one of the citizens of that 
 country.” 
 
 He was not hired; he felt that he must get out 
 of the city, so he went and begged a chance to 
 
THE PRODIGAL SON 
 
 85 
 
 live on a farm in the Far Country. The fanner 
 let him stay, but Prodigal soon found the differ¬ 
 ence between a farm worker in the Far Country 
 and the old homeland. The farmer sent him to 
 herd swine—the lowest grade of employment in 
 all the land. The hogs fed on the fruit of the 
 carab tree—a bean that grew in pods, much like 
 the seed pod on a honey locust tree, and as Prod¬ 
 igal saw the hogs devouring them, he was glad to 
 share with them to satisfy his hunger. And then 
 at last, eating carab husks with Syrian hogs, he 
 came to days of reflection and said to himself: 
 “ How many hired servants of my father’s have 
 bread enough and to spare, and I perish here with 
 hunger! ” 
 
 Now while Prodigal is thinking about the old 
 homestead, let us go back and see how fares the 
 father and Selfishness these days. 
 
 The noble father has gone on with his pure 
 life, full of generosity and kind deeds to all, be¬ 
 loved by all the neighbourhood; but many have 
 commented on the fact that there is a look of sad¬ 
 ness in his face that has grown since Prodigal left 
 home. Never a day has passed but the father has 
 kept his tryst with God in the secret chamber, 
 where he has prayed with a burdened heart not 
 only for Prodigal but also for Selfishness. 
 
 Selfishness has been as hard a problem for the 
 
86 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 father as Prodigal.; As he has grown older, the 
 greedy, miserly streak in his make-up has grown 
 more and more marked. He has made friends 
 with no one save certain scheming and unscrupu¬ 
 lous money-getters who have an unsavoury repu¬ 
 tation for their hard and unfeeling conduct in their 
 treatment of the poor. They do not often come to 
 the house, for they are fully as disagreeable to the 
 great-hearted father as were the giddy and profli¬ 
 gate friends of Prodigal; but Selfishness is often 
 in counsel with them in devising questionable 
 money-getting schemes, and the father grieves and 
 feels that he has been sadly bereft of both his 
 sons. 
 
 However, he has never quite lost hope that 
 Prodigal may yet repent and return to him, and 
 every day when he comes out from his hour of 
 secret devotion he looks down the road on which 
 his boy will come if he returns from the Far Coun¬ 
 try. Every time Selfishness has heard any ru¬ 
 mours of his brother’s revels in dissipation, he has 
 gloated over it to his father; but the father still 
 prays, and waits, and hopes. 
 
 And now at last Prodigal is longing for home 
 and father. For a long time during his wasteful 
 days, when he was plunging madly into sinful de¬ 
 bauch with wicked men and equally wicked women, 
 wickedness which he knew would break his fa- 
 
THE PRODIGAL SON 
 
 87 
 
 tiler's heart, he did his best to put father out of 
 his mind. But now, with only the dumb hogs for 
 company, he has time to think, and father looms 
 large in his memory. Methinks I hear him say: 
 “ Father! What a wonderful man Father wasj 
 When have I seen a man like Father! I have not 
 seen a single man to be compared to Father since 
 I left home. Why, the best of men in the Far 
 Country would look like pigmies and dwarfs along¬ 
 side of Father! How big-hearted and fine he was! 
 He was good to everybody. How kind he was to 
 the servants! If they were sick or in trouble he 
 was father to them, too. When a stranger came 
 by, there was always a spare place at the table 
 and a spare bed for the night. And if a neigh¬ 
 bour got into trouble or was sick. Father was al¬ 
 ways on hand to help. My! what a father he 
 was to me! Even when I tried him by my wild, 
 wasteful ways, how patient and tender he was! 
 I used to think he was too old-fashioned. What 
 a fool I was to be ashamed of a glorious father 
 like that! And I got so tired and bored at his 
 family prayers, every morning and evening. Oh, 
 how I would like to hear Father pray again! ” 
 And then Prodigal's heart broke. It had been 
 frozen a long time, but the great thaw had come. 
 No south wind off the Gulf of Mexico, no Chinook 
 wind up in the Northwest, ever blew with such 
 
88 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 power as the wind of the Holy Spirit blew on 
 Prodigal’s soul then. There were only God and 
 the hogs to see as he sobbed and wept. At first it 
 was only the grief of despair. But when a sinner, 
 tired of sin, begins to weep over his sins, hope 
 soon sprouts under the melting ice of the thawing 
 heart. And very soon I hear Prodigal crying out 
 between his sobs: “ I will arise and go to my fa¬ 
 ther, and will say unto him, Father, I have sinned 
 against heaven, and in thy sight: I am no more 
 worthy to be called thy son: Make me as one of 
 thy hired servants.” 
 
 Ah, that sounds hopeful! Pride is gone. Self- 
 will is gone. Egotism and insolence are gone. 
 Humility is at the wheel. When a sinful man 
 begins to talk to himself like that, any good thing 
 may come to pass. So I am not astonished that 
 Jesus tells us, “And he arose, and came to his 
 father.” He had gone into the Far Country with 
 a fine turnout. He had the best chariot the coun¬ 
 try town could boast and the best horses on the 
 great home farm. But he goes back penniless. 
 He goes back all the weary miles on foot. But 
 with every step hope springs stronger in his heart, 
 and after a while he comes in sight of home. Oh! 
 was there ever a sight so glorious as that! And 
 then he sees some one standing on the porch look¬ 
 ing down the lane toward him. How his heart 
 
THE PRODIGAL SON 
 
 89 
 
 beats in his throat as he exclaims: “ Why, it’s Fa¬ 
 ther! It seems as if he were looking for me! It’s 
 just the way he used to stand and peer down the 
 lane when he was expecting me home from town! 
 But he would not know me in these rags and with 
 all this scraggly beard on my face! It’s awful 
 to come home to Father like this! Why! Look! 
 He sees me! He knows me! He’s coming! He’s 
 running! ” 
 
 And then Prodigal runs, too. They meet. They 
 are in each other’s arms. They cannot talk. They 
 just hug each other close and mingle their tears. 
 
 But Prodigal feels something must be said, and 
 at last he begins to unload that wonderful speech 
 he had been repeating over and over again all the 
 way home: “ Father, I have sinned against heaven, 
 and in thy sight: I am no more worthy to be called 
 thy son.” That is as far as he ever got with it. 
 There was a lot more about being taken on as a 
 servant. But the father would not listen to it. 
 He had plenty of servants; his dear old heart was 
 hungry for sons. So he brushed it all away with 
 the shout to his servants, who were now crowding 
 around, sobbing and crying and laughing together, 
 out of sympathy with the father they all loved. 
 “ Bring forth quickly,” he cried, “ the best robe, 
 and put it on him; and put a ring on his hand, and 
 shoes on his feet: and bring the fatted calf, and 
 
90 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 kill it, and let us eat, and make merry: for this 
 my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, 
 and is found.” And that old farmhouse went 
 gloriously alive with joy. 
 
 Yet, amid all that gladness, there was one 
 gloomy face, and that was the face of Selfishness. 
 Selfishness had been out in the field when Prodigal 
 came home, and by the time he came in for supper 
 the celebration had already begun, and to his 
 amazement and disgust, when he came near to the 
 old farmhouse, he heard music and saw that every 
 window was lighted and that dancing was going 
 on. He was angry in a moment. Surely Father 
 must be getting in his dotage to allow such waste 
 and folly. And when he got near enough, he 
 called one of the servants and demanded: “ What 
 does all this foolishness mean?” 
 
 “ Why, where have you been? Don’t you 
 know? Your brother, Prodigal, has come home 
 from the Far Country, and your father is so happy 
 about it that he has killed the fatted calf, because 
 he has received him safe and sound.” 
 
 Then Selfishness was angrier than ever. He 
 had hoped he had seen the last of Prodigal, and 
 here he was the center of all this joy. He would 
 not go into the house, and the servant went and 
 told the father. 
 
 The father, full of joy and good will toward all 
 
THE PRODIGAL SON 
 
 91 
 
 the world, went out to him and begged him to 
 come in and share in the welcome to his brother. 
 But Selfishness sullenly said: “ Lo, these many 
 years do I serve thee, and I never transgressed a 
 commandment of thine; and yet thou never gavest 
 me a kid, that I might make merry with my 
 friends: but when this thy son came, who hath 
 devoured thy living with harlots, thou killest for 
 him the fatted calf. ,, 
 
 Poor Selfishness! If the father had wished, he 
 could have said: “ Son, when have you ever de¬ 
 sired to make merry with any one? Your friends 
 are like you, so selfish and cold-hearted there is no 
 happy, wholesome merriment in them.” But the 
 father is too tender-hearted to answer him un¬ 
 kindly, so he patiently reasons with him: “ Son, 
 thou art ever with me, and all that is mine is thine. 
 But it was meet to make merry and be glad: for 
 this thy brother was dead, and is alive again; and 
 was lost, and is found/’ 
 
 Poor Selfishness! His road home was thornier 
 than Prodigal’s. 
 
 Some who have read this old but ever new story 
 have felt in your deepest soul that it is God’s mes¬ 
 sage to you. Do not let it fail of its purpose! 
 God is that Father; you are that Prodigal from 
 the Far Country. Come home to your Father’s 
 heart, here and now! 
 
92 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 And, greedy Selfishness, you come too! Deep 
 down in your conscience the Holy Spirit is con¬ 
 victing you of sin, and you realize that you need 
 the forgiving love of your Heavenly Father as 
 certainly as Prodigal. There is room for you 
 both in the Father’s heart and home. Come! 
 
VII 
 
 THE TWO DINNERS IN SIMON’S HOUSE 
 
 A SERMON FOR WOMEN 
 
 “And behold, a ‘Woman who was in the city, a 
 sinner; . . . brought an alabaster cruse of oint¬ 
 
 ment.” —Luke 7: 37. 
 
 “Mary therefore took a pound of ointment of 
 pure nard, very precious, and anointed the feet of 
 Jesus.” — John 12:3. 
 
 “ And while he was in Bethany in the house of 
 Simon the leper, as he sat at meat, there came a 
 woman having an alabaster cruse of ointment of 
 pure nard, very costly; and she brake the cruse, and 
 poured it over his head.” — Mark 14:3. 
 
 “Now when Jesus was in Bethany, in the house 
 of Simon the leper, there came unto him a woman 
 having an alabaster cruse of exceeding precious oint¬ 
 ment, and she poured it upon his head, as he sat at 
 meat ,”— Matthew 26 :6. 
 
 T HERE must undoubtedly have been two 
 dinners at the same house of Simon. 
 The same man and the same house, 
 though in one case he is spoken of as one of the 
 Pharisees, and in the latter case he is called Simon 
 the leper. The first dinner is recorded only by 
 Luke, and took place early in the ministry of 
 
 93 
 
94 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 Jesus. The latter dinner is recorded by Matthew, 
 Mark and John, and occurred in the Saviour’s last 
 week on earth. The women who are the chief 
 actors in each occasion are entirely different 
 women. 
 
 I am aware that St Augustine gives it as his 
 opinion that Mary of Bethany, the sister of 
 Martha and Lazarus, is the woman in each case. 
 But there is nothing to substantiate that theory. 
 He offers no evidence whatever to back up his 
 opinion, and Luke’s story is so graphically told 
 and so full of detail that we are very sure Mary 
 of Bethany is not the woman in that case. Be¬ 
 sides there is not the slightest suggestion in any of 
 the Bible stories or in any of the early traditions 
 coming down from those days among the early 
 Christians, that suggests such a thing as any so¬ 
 cial impropriety or lack of moral character in 
 Mary of Bethany. There is not even a hint that 
 she had lived a life of vice. 
 
 Neither is there any reason for coupling the 
 name of Mary Magdalene with this first dinner, 
 the story of which is told by St. Luke. Christian 
 artists assumed that because Luke records that 
 Christ cast seven devils out of Mary of Magdala 
 she was the woman who came to the Master in 
 tears of repentance at this first dinner in Simon’s 
 house. But there is no real reason for such an 
 
TWO DINNERS IN SIMON’S HOUSE 95 
 
 idea. Practically all the Bible tells us about Mary 
 Magdalene is in that brief paragraph of Luke’s 
 when he says: “And with him the twelve, and 
 certain women who had been healed of evil spirits 
 and infirmities: Mary, that was called Magdalene, 
 from whom seven demons had gone out, and 
 Joanna the wife of Chuzas Herod’s steward, and 
 Susanna, and many others, who ministered unto 
 them of their substance.” 
 
 This simple mention tells us Mary belonged to 
 Magdala, one of the thriving towns which then 
 clustered round the Lake of Galilee, and she was 
 called the Magdalene to distinguish her from other 
 Marys. She was undoubtedly of good birth, a 
 Jewish gentlewoman, since Luke gives her pre¬ 
 cedence over the wife of Herod’s steward. Her 
 time seems to have been at her disposal, and be¬ 
 ing well-to-do, she was able to minister financially 
 to the needs of Jesus and His disciples. The rea¬ 
 son for her great devotion to Christ is found by 
 Luke in the fact that out of her went seven devils. 
 Whatever sins of temper or conduct might be sug¬ 
 gested by that statement, there is nothing in the 
 account to suggest social immorality, since she was 
 in accepted friendship with the other devout 
 women whose characters were above reproach. So 
 we are forced to the opinion that the early Chris¬ 
 tian art which made the very name Magdalene a 
 
96 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 synonym for harlot is cruelly unjust and entirely 
 without reason. 
 
 About this unknown woman who came to Jesus 
 in the house of Simon the Pharisee, we know 
 nothing save what is told us by Luke. We know 
 from Luke’s story that she was not an invited 
 guest, but having heard that Christ was there, and 
 desiring above all else on earth the opportunity of 
 showing her faith in Him, and receiving from 
 Him the forgiveness of her many sins, she went 
 in, uninvited, to Simon’s house, and presented her¬ 
 self in tears at the feet of Jesus as He reclined, 
 according to the custom of the day, at the dinner 
 table. 
 
 How did this woman come to know about and 
 believe on Jesus? I have my own idea, and while 
 I have no evidence to sustain it, I think it ex¬ 
 tremely probable and as good as any other. 
 
 We have another case of a sinful woman in the 
 New Testament story, a woman who had been 
 taken prisoner in the act of her sin and was 
 brought to Jesus while He was teaching in the 
 Temple. And these Scribes and Pharisees brought 
 the shamed and embarrassed woman to Christ, not 
 because they were especially grieved or shocked at 
 her sin, but hoping to use her as a trap in which 
 they might catch the Saviour and have an excuse 
 to bring Him before the Sanhedrim for trial. 
 
TWO DINNERS IN SIMON’S HOUSE 97 
 
 You recall the story which John tells in the 
 eighth chapter of his Gospel: They brought the 
 poor woman right into the midst of the group 
 gathered about Jesus, and sat her down before 
 Him and said: “ Teacher, this woman hath been 
 taken in adultery, in the very act. Now in the 
 law Moses commanded us to stone such: what then 
 sayest thou of her? ” John says that they put it 
 to Him that way “ trying him, that they might 
 have whereof to accuse him.” But Jesus stooped 
 down, and with His finger wrote on the ground. 
 But as they sneered, and continued to press their 
 question, thinking they had embarrassed Him, He 
 straightened up and said calmly and quietly, “ He 
 that is without sin among you, let him first cast a 
 stone at her.” If Jesus had fired a shotgun into 
 that crowd. He could not have scattered them 
 faster; one after another they sneaked out of the 
 Temple, and after a while Jesus looked up and 
 said: “ Woman, where are they? did no man con¬ 
 demn thee?” And she said: “ No man, Lord.” 
 And Jesus said: “ Neither do I condemn thee: go 
 thy way; from henceforth sin no more.” 
 
 Well, that is all that is told us in the Bible 
 about that woman, but I think I know something 
 more about her. I think she went home full of 
 wonder about it all and full of love and gratitude 
 to Jesus. The old life seemed hateful to her, and 
 
98 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 she determined to keep faith with Christ and sin 
 no more, and so she did not go back any more to 
 the old revelling places, and one of her friends, a 
 woman we will call Migdol, who really liked her, 
 hunted her up at her home, wanting to know what 
 had happened. So she told her story of how she 
 had been dragged to the Temple in disgrace and 
 how Jesus had saved her. And as she tells the 
 story I draw near and listen: “And, oh, Migdol, I 
 wish you too could see Jesus; He is the most won¬ 
 derful man I ever dreamed of. I felt so safe with 
 Him. My sins never seemed so bad, so black, as 
 when I looked in His kind eyes, and yet they 
 looked at me as if He understood, and yet loved 
 me, and wanted to help me to be good. And when 
 He said: ‘Neither do I condemn thee; go thy 
 way: from henceforth sin no more/ I felt as 
 though a great door shut to behind me, between 
 me and all that old wicked life, and I am deter¬ 
 mined that I will die before I will ever go back 
 into it again. I just feel that it would break His 
 heart if I did, and I could not bear to hurt and 
 grieve Him.” 
 
 Migdol listened in astonishment and said, “ I 
 did not know there was any one like that.” 
 
 “ I did not either until I saw Him, but, Migdol, 
 I feel like a new woman since I looked in His eyes, 
 and He spoke so kindly to me. I have got my old 
 
TWO DINNERS IN SIMON’S HOUSE 99 
 
 self-respect back again, and with God’s help I am 
 going to be a good woman and keep faith with 
 Jesus and ‘ sin no more.’ ” 
 
 Migdol’s eyes were full of tears now, and she 
 said with infinite longing in her voice: “ I wish I 
 could see Him, too. I am awfully sick and tired 
 of this wretched life I have been leading. Where 
 do you suppose I might find Him? ” 
 
 “ Why, Migdol, I can tell you where you can 
 find Him this very evening. One of my neigh¬ 
 bours has a son who delivers goods from the store 
 at the house of Simon, the rich Pharisee, and the 
 steward told him that the famous Rabbi people are 
 talking about so much, Jesus of Nazareth, was to 
 be a guest at dinner there to-day.” 
 
 “Well,” said Migdol, “I am going to walk 
 around that way a little before dinner time, and I 
 pray God I may get to see Him. If it could do 
 me as much good as it has you, it would be worth 
 traveling a week to find Him.” 
 
 Then Migdol went home, greatly excited with 
 this new idea about Jesus. 
 
 Poor woman! Her sins were giving her only 
 misery and disappointment. She was feeding on 
 ashes. The pleasures of sin are only a scaffold 
 to build wicked habits that become cruel chains. 
 But her friend’s story about Jesus and the won¬ 
 derful change that had been wrought in her gave 
 
100 -WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 Migdol hope that possibly there was a chance for 
 her, too, to escape the horrible slough of sin and 
 be a good and happy woman again. 
 
 As she thought and planned how she might get 
 to see Him, she noticed a beautiful alabaster cruse 
 of precious ointment, and she took it up, saying 
 to herself, “ I will take it with me, and who knows 
 but I may get a chance to anoint this wonderful 
 friend of poor, sinful girls.” And so she went 
 away down the street, and as she drew near 
 Simon's fine house, it being a mild day, the doors 
 were open and she saw Jesus, already in His 
 place, with the other guests at the table. As she 
 looked on that wonderful face her heart went out 
 to Him in confidence and trust. No woman ever 
 looked on the face of Jesus without trusting Him, 
 and Migdol, forgetting everything save that here 
 was her chance to get to Jesus and show how she 
 trusted Him and honoured Him, went right on 
 into the house, uninvited though she was. 
 
 She stood for a moment behind Him, silently 
 weeping, and then suddenly her heart broke and 
 she flung herself down at the Master's feet and her 
 flood of bitter tears of repentance for her sins and 
 all the waste of her wretched life fell on the feet 
 of Jesus. She had a wealth of beautiful hair that 
 in the violence of her grief had been loosened and 
 now fell about her shoulders. She took the long 
 
TWO DINNERS IN SIMON’S HOUSE 101 
 
 locks of her hair and wiped her tears from the 
 feet of the Saviour. 
 
 As soon as she could calm her grief a little, she 
 remembered the precious box of alabaster she had 
 brought. She was so glad now that she had 
 brought it. She wished she might anoint that 
 beautiful head; but no, her sins were too great, 
 she would anoint His dear feet, and show her 
 humility and faith all the more. The perfume 
 filled the room and, of course, her conduct was the 
 center of all eyes and absorbed both host and 
 guests. Jesus understood perfectly. He, who 
 knew what was in man, knew from the start that 
 here was a poor sinful soul, repenting of sin and 
 seeking for forgiveness and salvation; and forth 
 from His great heart of love went waves of heal¬ 
 ing mercy. But Simon, his Pharisee host, was 
 full of critical questioning. As he looked on he 
 said to himself, “ This man, if he were a prophet, 
 would have perceived who and what manner of 
 woman this is that toucheth him, that she is a 
 sinner.” 
 
 Now Jesus knew what was going on in Simon’s 
 mind as well as the great surrender that was taking 
 place in the heart of Migdol, so He turned to 
 Simon and said: “ Seest thou this woman? I 
 entered into thy house, thou gavest me no water 
 for my feet; but she hath wetted my feet with her 
 
102 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 tears, and wiped them with her hair. Thou gavest 
 me no kiss: but she, since the time I came in, hath 
 not ceased to kiss my feet. My head with oil thou 
 didst not anoint: but she hath anointed my feet 
 with ointment. Wherefore I say unto thee, Her 
 sins, which are many, are forgiven; for she loved 
 much: but to whom little is forgiven, the same 
 loveth little. ,, And turning to Migdol, whose 
 tears of repentance had turned to a summer rain 
 of joy at His wonderful words to Simon, Jesus 
 looked into her radiant face, shining like a rain¬ 
 bow through her tears, and said, “ Thy sins are 
 forgiven, thy faith hath saved thee; go in peace.” 
 And Migdol went out from Simon’s dinner, walk¬ 
 ing on air, to be henceforth the devoted and joyous 
 friend and witness to Christ and His power to 
 forgive sins. 
 
 Now just a word about this second dinner: It 
 was evidently a community dinner to Jesus, held 
 in Simon’s house because it was the largest and 
 most commodious of any in the group. See what 
 John says of it: “ So they made him a supper 
 there: and Martha served; but Lazarus was one 
 of them that sat at meat with him. Mary there¬ 
 fore took a pound of ointment of pure nard, very 
 precious, and anointed the feet of Jesus, and wiped 
 his feet with her hair; and the house was filled 
 with the odour of the ointment.” 
 
TWO DINNERS IN SIMON’S HOUSE 103 
 
 Matthew and Mark also tell this incident as 
 occurring during this last week of the Saviour’s 
 life. They do not name Mary as the woman, no 
 doubt because when they wrote their Gospels Mary 
 was still living and they did not wish to call spe¬ 
 cial attention to her; neither do they mention 
 Lazarus, because the Jews might kill him to de¬ 
 stroy his witness to Christ. Matthew and Mark 
 state that Mary broke her box of ointment above 
 the head of Jesus. No doubt she did first anoint 
 the Saviour’s head and afterward His feet also, 
 and the humility of that act so impressed itself on 
 John’s mind that when, as an old man, nearly or 
 quite ninety, he came to write his Gospel, he refers 
 only to the anointing of the feet; and as Mary by 
 that time had gone on to heaven, as well as Laz¬ 
 arus, who is supposed to have lived thirty years 
 after Jesus raised him from the dead, John gives 
 both their names. 
 
 Evidently since the first dinner to Jesus in 
 Simon’s house, Simon had become a Christian and 
 was a close friend of that little family of Bethany 
 where Martha and Mary and Lazarus lived, for 
 they were all guests at this second dinner and 
 Martha had charge of the serving. And I have 
 no doubt that Simon had told Mary how the 
 woman at the first dinner had anointed the feet 
 of Jesus and wiped them with her hair, and now 
 
104 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS' 
 
 feeling that the end was near in the earthly life 
 of her Lord, Mary shows her humility by follow¬ 
 ing the example of the woman who “ was a sin¬ 
 ner,no doubt feeling in her grateful heart that 
 it was only the grace of God which had given her 
 own life a sheltered pathway that made the dif¬ 
 ference between them, and so she, too, kneels at 
 Jesus' feet and anoints them and wipes them with 
 her hair. 
 
 So we have these three women who loved Jesus 
 and found in Him a perfect Saviour and the for¬ 
 giveness of their sins—Mary of Bethany, who 
 early gave her heart's deepest love to Jesus in the 
 sheltered quiet of her own peaceful home; Mary 
 Magdalene, a woman of high social position, but 
 under an evil dominion with sevenfold cords that 
 only Christ had power to break and set her free to 
 a life of sweet and beautiful Christian ministry, 
 which was specially honoured by her Lord by His 
 appearance and words of love to her on the first 
 Easter morning; and poor Migdol, wasted and 
 torn by many sins, yet healed and comforted and 
 saved by the same Lord in whom the Marys trusted 
 and found their all. 
 
 Jesus is still the woman’s friend. Many women 
 who will read this study have felt their need of a 
 friend, a Saviour, like Jesus. Whatever your sin, 
 whatever your weakness, whatever your need. 
 
TWO DINNERS IN SIMON’S HOUSE 105 
 
 Jesus Christ, the divine Man, the perfect Friend, 
 offers Himself to you to-day as your Saviour 
 and your Lord. No woman ever yet regretted giv¬ 
 ing her trust to Jesus. Bring Him here and now 
 the fragrant alabaster box of your confidence and 
 love, and hear His sweet words of blessing ring¬ 
 ing in your ears and in your heart. 
 
VIII 
 
 three interesting witnesses 
 
 FOR CHRIST 
 
 “ One thing I know, that, whereas I was blind, now 
 I see ” — John 9 : 25 . 
 
 “After these things Joseph of Arimathea, being 
 a disciple of Jesus, but secretly for fear of the Jews, 
 asked of Pilate that he might take away the body of 
 Jesus.” — John 19 : 38 . 
 
 “And there came also Nicodemus, he who at first 
 came to him by night, bringing a mixture of myrrh 
 and aloes, about, a hundred poundsA — John 19 : 39 . 
 
 T HE first of these three witnesses to Christ 
 was a man who was born blind and with 
 parents so poor that he had to beg for his 
 daily food. And yet John, who wrote a very con¬ 
 densed life of Jesus, uses only four verses to tell 
 about the public confession of Christ by Joseph 
 and Nicodemus, and uses ten times that number 
 to tell about the healing and conversion and con¬ 
 fession of the poor blind beggar. 
 
 Blindness is a very common affliction in the 
 East. In Europe only one in a thousand are blind, 
 but in Egypt and Palestine one in a hundred are 
 
 without the blessing of sight. Of the six miracles 
 
 106 
 
THREE INTERESTING- WITNESSES 107 
 
 connected with blindness which are recorded in 
 the Gospels, this is the only case described as 
 blindness from birth. In this lies its special char¬ 
 acteristic, for the blind man spoke truthfully when 
 he said to his questioners, “ Since the world began 
 it was never heard that any one opened the eyes of 
 a man born blind.” 
 
 The occasion of his healing came about as Jesus 
 was passing by with His disciples. As the group 
 drew near to the blind man’s begging stand, one of 
 the disciples put to Jesus the question, no doubt 
 pointing the Master’s attention to the blind beggar, 
 “ Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that 
 he should be bom blind?” Jesus answered, 
 “Neither did this man sin, nor his parents: but 
 that the works of God should be made manifest 
 in him. We must work the works of him that 
 sent me, while it is day: the night cometh, when 
 no man can work. When I am in the world, I am 
 the light of the world.” And then Jesus spat on 
 the ground, and made clay of the spittle, and 
 anointed the eyes of the blind man, and told him 
 to go and wash in the pool of Siloam, not far 
 away; and without an answer back, or quibbling, 
 or delay, he went immediately and washed, and 
 came back seeing. 
 
 In the meantime Christ and His disciples had 
 gone on. The beggar seems to have gone home 
 
108 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 at once, we can well imagine, in great excitement 
 and delight. His neighbours had a controversy 
 about the matter. Some said: “ This is our neigh¬ 
 bour’s son, that used to sit and beg by the side of 
 the road.” But others would not believe it, 
 though they admitted he looked like him; but he 
 said: “I am he.” Then they asked him, “How 
 were thine eyes opened? ” And he said: “ A man 
 that is called Jesus made clay, and anointed mine 
 eyes, and said unto me. Go to Siloam, and wash: 
 so I went away and washed, and I received sight.” 
 Then the neighbours wanted to know where Jesus 
 was, but he was unable to tell them. 
 
 So some of these curious busybody neighbours 
 took him in hand and brought him to the Phari¬ 
 sees. They at once brought up the question of his 
 being healed on the Sabbath day, and when in 
 answer to their questions he repeated his story of 
 his healing, instead of being happy over him and 
 congratulating him on the wonderful blessing he 
 had received in his sight, they said to him: “ This 
 
 t 
 
 man is not from God, because he keepeth not the 
 Sabbath.” But others standing by said: “How 
 can a man that is a sinner do such signs? ” And 
 they were divided into two factions. So they 
 turned again to the man who had received his sight 
 and asked what he thought about Christ: “ What 
 sayest thou of him, in that he opened thine eyes? ” 
 
THESE INTERESTING WITNESSES 109 
 
 His answer was, “ He is a prophet.” Then they 
 began to doubt whether he had ever been blind, 
 and they called his parents as witnesses and asked: 
 “ Is this your son, who ye say was born blind ?, 
 how then doth he now see ? ” The parents an¬ 
 swered, “ We know that this is our son, and that 
 he was born blind: but how he now seeth, we 
 know not; . . . ask him; he is of age; he 
 
 shall speak for himself.” 
 
 I have never taken much stock in those parents. 
 They were cheap and cowardly. They knew very 
 well that their son told the truth about how he 
 received his sight, but they lied to save themselves 
 from being cast out of the synagogue. The boy 
 must have harked back to a nobler grandfather or 
 grandmother, for he was of better stuff than his 
 parents; and when they said to him in a tone of 
 threatening, “Give glory to God: we know that 
 this man is a sinner,” he said, “ Whether he is a 
 sinner, I know not; one thing I know, that, 
 whereas I was blind, now I see.” And when they 
 tried to confuse him by asking him over again 
 how he had received his sight, he answered them, 
 “ I told you even now, and ye did not hear; where¬ 
 fore would ye hear it again? would ye also become 
 his disciples? ” 
 
 Then they reviled him and spoke insultingly to 
 him. “ Thou art his disciple,” they said, “ but we 
 
110 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 are disciples of Moses. We know that God hath 
 spoken unto Moses: but as for this man, we know 
 not whence he is.” 
 
 Then the real metal that was in the former blind 
 beggar shines forth. He answers, “ Why, herein 
 is the marvel, that ye know not whence he is, and 
 yet he opened mine eyes. We know that God 
 heareth not sinners; but if any man be a wor¬ 
 shiper of God, and do his will, him he heareth. 
 Since the world began it was never heard that any 
 one opened the eyes of a man born blind. If this 
 man were not from God, he could do nothing.” 
 
 That was too much for the Pharisees. They 
 could not answer him, so they raged at him: 
 “ Thou wast altogether born in sins, and dost thou 
 teach us ? ” And they cast him out. Poor Phari¬ 
 sees, they were blinder than he. John Ruskin 
 says: “ The greatest thing a human soul ever does 
 in this world is to see something, and to tell what 
 it sees in a plain way. Hundreds of people can 
 talk to one who can think; but thousands can think 
 to one who can see. To see clearly is poetry, 
 prophecy and religion all in one.” To one who 
 can really see, 
 
 “ The common sun, the air, the skies, 
 
 To him are opening Paradise.” 
 
 When Jesus heard that the Pharisees had cast 
 
THREE INTERESTING WITNESSES 111 
 
 the former blind beggar out of the synagogue, He 
 immediately looked him up. You may always de¬ 
 pend upon it that Jesus will more than make up 
 for whatever you suffer on account of your fidelity 
 to Him; He will make it up to you many times 
 over. Paul found it so, and could exclaim in the 
 midst of the most terrible troubles that can come 
 to man, “ For our light affliction, which is for the 
 moment, worketh for us more and more exceed¬ 
 ingly an eternal weight of glory.” You will never 
 lose by standing faithfully for Christ. Jesus 
 looked up the man the Pharisees cast out, and 
 when He found him He said: “ Dost thou be¬ 
 lieve on the Son of God? ” Ouick as a flash came 
 back his reply: “Who is he, Lord, that I may 
 believe on him? ” Jesus said to him, “ Thou hast 
 both seen him, and he it is that speaketh with 
 thee.” And he said, “ Lord, I believe,” and right 
 there and then he worshiped Christ as the Son of 
 God. 
 
 This blind man, healed of his blindness and con¬ 
 verted from his sins, was a wonderful witness for 
 Christ. He never lost a chance to speak out. He 
 did not undertake to speculate about things he 
 knew nothing about; but the things Christ had 
 done for him he knew, and knew better than any 
 one else. They were solid rock under his feet, 
 and he stood there, never wavering for a moment. 
 
112 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 Oh, friends, if you have given your heart to Christ 
 and He has forgiven your sins and given you the 
 blessed gladness and assurance of His love in your 
 heart, you have the credentials in your own soul 
 that you are a Christian, and you need not fear 
 what man can do unto you. The Pharisees cast 
 this man out, but, as Mr. Moody used to chuckle 
 and say, “ They cast him right into the arms of a 
 loving Saviour.” They had no power to separate 
 him from Jesus. And man has no power to do 
 that now. Paul says: “ Who shall separate us 
 from the love of Christ? shall tribulation, or an¬ 
 guish, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or 
 peril, or sword, . . . Nay, in all these things 
 
 we are more than conquerors through him that 
 loved us. For I am persuaded, that neither death, 
 nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things 
 present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor 
 height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be 
 able to separate us from the love of God, which is 
 in Christ Jesus our Lord.” 
 
 Surely this healed and converted blind man was 
 a first-class witness for Jesus. 
 
 Now the other two witnesses I wish to call to 
 your attention were very different men. They 
 were Jewish gentlemen. They were well born, 
 well educated, moral, religious, thoroughly high- 
 toned, cultivated men. They had both been inter- 
 
THREE INTERESTING WITNESSES 113 
 
 ested in Jesus during the years of His ministry. 
 They were both members of the Sanhedrim. We 
 have no record that Joseph of Arimathea ever 
 had any personal conversation with Jesus. But 
 we do have a record that he once stood up in a 
 meeting of the Sanhedrim and defended Jesus, 
 and we know from John’s statement that he knew 
 sufficiently about Christ to have secretly become 
 His disciple, and that he gave his vote against the 
 condemnation of the Saviour; but his fear of pub¬ 
 lic sentiment had held him from open confession 
 of his faith in and love for Christ until after He 
 was dead. But after Christ had been crucified, 
 Joseph’s conscience smote him for his cowardice, 
 and he determined that he would no longer cover 
 up his affection for his Lord, but would let all the 
 world know that he believed on Christ as the 
 Messiah and Saviour of the world. So he hur¬ 
 ried away to Pilate and begged the body of Jesus 
 that he might bury it in his own new tomb. 
 
 Nicodemus had had still more knowledge of 
 Jesus early in the Saviour’s ministry. He had 
 become greatly interested in Christ’s teaching as 
 well as in His miracles, and he came to Jesus by 
 night and conversed with Plim about many deep 
 things of the soul and concerning man’s relation to 
 God. Some of the greatest truths of the Gospel 
 Christ first preached to Nicodemus. It was to him 
 
114 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 Jesus announced the great doctrine of the new 
 birth, saying, “ Marvel not that I said unto thee. 
 Ye must be born anew. The wind bloweth where 
 it will, and thou hearest the voice thereof, but 
 knowest not whence it cometh, and whither it 
 goeth: so is every one that is born of the Spirit.” 
 
 It was to Nicodemus that Jesus revealed the 
 method of salvation by faith, saying, “And as 
 Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even 
 so must the Son of man be lifted up; that whoso¬ 
 ever believeth may in him have eternal life.” 
 
 It was to Nicodemus in that same wonderful 
 conversation that Jesus gave utterance to the mar¬ 
 velous love of God in the atonement for sin 
 through Jesus Christ when He made that glorious 
 utterance: “For God so loved the world, that he 
 gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever be¬ 
 lieveth on him should not perish, but have eternal 
 life.” 
 
 And yet, though he was convinced that Jesus 
 was a teacher come from God, he did not openly 
 come out as His disciple. He did at one time de¬ 
 fend Him in the Council, until some one sneer- 
 ingly wanted to know if he also was a Galilean; 
 but at that he subsided into silence. But when 
 Jesus died on the cross, he, too, was shamed out 
 of his secret discipleship and went with Joseph to 
 bury Jesus. 
 
THREE INTERESTING WITNESSES 115 
 
 He brought with him sweet spices and all the 
 rich gifts of love which he had failed to give in 
 Christ’s lifetime. Joseph of Arimathea and Nico- 
 demus, rich, cultivated, powerful men, both made 
 most open confession of Jesus, but they waited 
 until after He had given His life for them on the 
 shameful and cruel cross before they did it. We 
 may well imagine that in talking together about it 
 afterward, one would say to the other: “ I would 
 to God that you and I had given our all to Christ 
 while He lived. We might have given the Saviour 
 many comforts, and the weight of our influence 
 might have swung the minds and hearts of many 
 others to His side.” But they did make confes¬ 
 sion of their faith, and right royally did they do 
 it. 
 
 Many of you have known about Jesus all your 
 lives. You are convinced that He is the Saviour 
 of the world. And yet you are giving Him no 
 open confession. He died on the cross for you as 
 truly as He did for Joseph or Nicodemus. He 
 gave Himself as a ransom for your soul. You are 
 not your own. You have been brought back from 
 evil at a great price, even the precious blood of the 
 Son of God. And He asks of you that you shall 
 accept salvation at His hand. He asks that you 
 confess Him before men. He tenderly, lovingly, 
 pleadingly, is saying to you, “ Every one who shall 
 
116 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 confess me before men, him will I also confess 
 before my Father who is in heaven. ,, 
 
 Do not, I plead with you, sin against His tender¬ 
 ness and compassion until in grieved and thwarted 
 and disappointed love He will be compelled to say 
 to you: “ But whosoever shall deny me before men, 
 him will I also deny before my Father who is in 
 heaven.” 
 
 All the beauty and the joy of the Christian life 
 is now within your reach. Seize now upon all the 
 unsearchable riches of salvation! 
 
IX 
 
 THE RESTORATION OF PETER 
 
 “ He saith unto him the third time, Simon, son of 
 John, lovest thou me? Peter was grieved because 
 he said unto him the third time, Lovest thou me? 
 And he said unto him, Lord, thou knowest all things; 
 thou knowest that I love thee. Jesus saith unto him, 
 Feed my sheep .”— John 21:17. 
 
 I N many ways this restoration of Peter is the 
 most wonderful of all the Bible conversions. 
 No one had known Jesus more intimately 
 than Peter. He had been preeminently the leader 
 in the apostolic band. It was Peter who had first 
 openly declared that Jesus was the Christ, the Son 
 of the living God, and had won the praise of the 
 Master for his spiritual discernment. 
 
 Peter was one of the three friends of Jesus who 
 made up the inner circle among those twelve 
 chosen friends of Christ whom we call His dis¬ 
 ciples. On great occasions these three most inti¬ 
 mate friends were always with their Lord. 
 
 When Jesus went up on the mountain to meet 
 Moses and Elijah, to talk with those mighty serv¬ 
 ants of God concerning His atoning sacrifice on 
 the cross, and was transfigured before them, He 
 
 took with Him Peter, James, and John. And 
 
 117 
 
118 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 after the last communion, when the Lord went out 
 into the Garden of Gethsemane to His hour of 
 unspeakable agony, it was Peter, James, and John 
 whom the Master took with Him as friends upon 
 whom His soul would lean in that hour of trial. 
 It was Peter who had declared that though all men 
 should forsake Christ, he would remain faithful; 
 yet when the trial came and he had followed Jesus, 
 after His arrest, into the High Priest’s yard, and 
 was warming his cold hands at the enemies’ fire, it 
 was Peter who allowed the taunt of a servant girl 
 to turn him into a coward, and he profanely and 
 bitterly denied his Lord. 
 
 How vividly the picture stands out. Judas has 
 betrayed his Lord with a kiss, with the shameful 
 thirty pieces of silver in his pocket Peter, brave 
 at first, drew his sword and stained it with blood 
 in Christ’s defense; but when rebuked for his 
 action, he seems to have lost all hope and courage; 
 and, when questioned later in the Lord’s very 
 presence, denied that he even knew Him. And 
 then the cock crowed, and he caught the tender, 
 sad look of Christ, and it broke his heart. He 
 went out and wept bitterly. 
 
 It must have been a sad and awful time for 
 Peter from then until Easter morning. On Easter 
 day a ray of sunlight shot through the darkness of 
 Peter’s gloom. For on that first Easter morning, 
 
THE RESTORATION OF PETER 119 
 
 when the Marys came and found the empty tomb, 
 Jesus appeared to them and told them to go and 
 tell His disciples “ and Peter ” of His resurrection. 
 That Christ should especially have mentioned him 
 in that way, as one to receive personal messages 
 from the Lord, must have been healing balm to 
 his sore heart. 
 
 But peace did not come until the morning 
 following the night when they had fished all 
 night and caught nothing, and Jesus • appeared 
 in the dawn walking on the beach. And the Lord 
 called to them, “ Children, have ye aught to eat ? ” 
 And they answered Him, “ No.” And He directed 
 them to cast their net on the right side of the boat, 
 and the catch was so great they could not draw 
 it in. Then it was John who said to Peter, “ It is 
 the Lord ”; and Peter’s poor, sore bleeding heart 
 leaped with hope. He said to himself, “ This is 
 my chance to have a word with Jesus, and tell 
 Him how I repent of my sin.” And immediately 
 he girt his fisher’s coat about him and plunged 
 into the water and swam for Jesus. And at Jesus’ 
 feet Peter told his story of confession, poured out 
 his heart to his loving Master. Then they brought 
 in the fish, and Peter counted them and found there 
 were one hundred and fifty-three. Peter was a 
 good fisherman. Then Jesus is host, and cooks 
 the fish and serves them, and when they have 
 
120 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 eaten together, Christ makes Peter’s restoration 
 certain to the minds and knowledge of the other 
 disciples. Suddenly turning to Peter as they re¬ 
 clined about their open-air camp breakfast table, 
 Jesus says to Peter: “ Simon, son of John, lovest 
 thou me more than these? ” And Peter answers: 
 “ Yea, Lord, thou knowest that I love thee.” Jesus 
 said, “ Feed my lambs.” And then a second time 
 He said to Peter: “Simon, son of John, lovest 
 thou me? ” and Peter answers again, “ Yea, Lord, 
 thou knowest that I love thee.” And Jesus says, 
 “ Tend my sheep.” And then for the third time 
 Jesus says to Peter, “ Simon, son of John, lovest 
 thou me ? ” Peter was grieved at the third repeti¬ 
 tion of the question, and in sorrow he exclaims, 
 “ Lord, thou knowest all things; thou knowest that 
 I love thee.” You will notice how different this 
 reply of Peter’s is to the time when he, with so 
 much self-confident bravado, declared, “ Though 
 all men forsake thee, I will be faithful.” Then he 
 was trusting in himself, but now he appeals to 
 Christ’s knowledge of his heart, and his reliance, 
 not on himself, but on the Lord. And so Peter’s 
 backsliding was healed and he was restored to his 
 fellowship with God and Christ and to his place of 
 leadership in the apostolic band. 
 
 This wonderful restoration of Peter has gone 
 into the literature and art of the Church and of 
 
THE RESTORATION OF PETER 121 
 
 the world. One of the most interesting stories 
 connected with it that has ever come to my knowl¬ 
 edge was told recently by Miss Genevieve Cowles 
 in the November and December numbers of Mc¬ 
 Clure's Magazine for 1922. 
 
 Miss Cowles and her twin sister, who was also 
 an artist, were given a commission to paint six 
 altar panels in a chapel of Christ Church, New 
 Haven, Connecticut. One of these panels was to 
 illustrate the cry for release from bondage. The 
 subject given for this panel was from the prayer, 
 “ O key of David and Scepter of the House of 
 Israel, thou that openest and no man shutteth, 
 and shuttest and no man openeth, come and loose 
 the prisoner from the prison house, and him that 
 sitteth in darkness from the shadow of death.” 
 
 To really illustrate this prayer, Miss Cowles felt 
 that she must visit a prison and saturate her soul 
 with the prison atmosphere, absorb the prison 
 spirit, and see how a prisoner looked. 
 
 It was during these investigations that she came 
 to feel an indescribable longing to be of some real 
 Christlike help to prisoners. The prison face, the 
 awful prison look, got on her nerves and pervaded 
 her soul with deep desire to help, until at last she 
 and her sister began daily to pray together: “ Oh, 
 God! Is there no way to bring back the light to 
 those faces? God! Show the way.” At last it 
 
122 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 resolved back to the personal equation, as any 
 great longing or vision of the soul does, and they 
 began to cry: “ What can we do to help the pris¬ 
 oners? ” 
 
 Now, these sisters were very poor; they had no 
 money save what they earned by hard work; but 
 they loved God and Christ and their fellow men 
 and wanted to cure some of the heartache they 
 had seen in the faces of prisoners. So, finally, 
 Miss Cowles said to the warden at the prison at 
 Wethersfield, Connecticut, timidly: “If we, my 
 sister and I, should do anything beautiful for the 
 prison, would you accept it? Because before this 
 we have asked hard things by faith, and the faith 
 has been answered.” 
 
 The warden replied: “I want a great painting 
 to be placed on that blank wall,” pointing to the 
 farther end of the prison chapel, a space probably 
 twenty-five feet by forty, “ to stand for courage 
 and hope. When a man here loses courage and 
 hope he goes mad.” And then he urged these 
 sisters to paint that picture. Their chance had 
 come. 
 
 While debating over the theme to be used in 
 tire picture, a strange happening decided it. Miss 
 Genevieve Cowles had done a deliberate act of 
 wrong. She awakened in the night and began to 
 cry with conviction of sin; her sister, Maude 
 
THE RESTORATION OF PETER 123 
 
 Cowles, was with her. She knew her sister was 
 crying because she had done wrong. Her sym¬ 
 pathy with her sister’s grief made her remember 
 the problem about the picture for the prisoners 
 and, trying to comfort her, she cried out: “ Oh, I 
 know what it is!—The message for the prisoners. 
 It is what the Lord said to Peter, ‘ Feed my 
 sheep.’ ” And in a moment it came to Miss Gene¬ 
 vieve Cowles like a vision, the unutterable beauty 
 of that scene of the after-resurrection days, when 
 the Lord came back and spoke to penitent Peter. 
 
 And again and again it kept coming to her, until 
 it was decided. They were twins; they did every¬ 
 thing together. It was agreed that Miss Genevieve 
 would paint the Lord and Peter, and Miss Maude, 
 St. John and the background. The other figures 
 would be divided between them, and the painting, 
 as a whole, would be called “ The Charge of St. 
 Peter.” It was to be a silent sermon of hope and 
 courage. 
 
 But it was to cost a lot of money, for it would 
 be a work of years. Where would the money 
 come from? They talked with some friends as 
 poor as themselves, and then with God, and then a 
 letter came from a woman they had never heard 
 of, enclosing twenty-five dollars. A blind girl gave 
 thirty-five dollars for the picture she could never 
 see. It went slowly. Then Miss Maude died. I 
 
124 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 have not time to tell of the long struggle. One by 
 one people became interested. Finally she had two 
 thousand dollars in her fund, and was persuaded 
 to take this and go to the Holy Land, where she 
 could get the true atmosphere and perspective 
 from which to paint her great picture. She spent 
 two years in the Holy Land, sustained by friends, 
 known and unknown, who sent voluntary gifts. 
 Once the officials and the prisoners of the Con¬ 
 necticut State Prison united in a subscription for 
 “ The Charge of St. Peter.” 
 
 Then she came back to America and painted 
 her silent sermon of courage and hope. In all, 
 she worked seven years. It was a marvelous la¬ 
 bour of love, and if you are ever in Hartford you 
 will be deeply moved if you go out to the Wethers¬ 
 field Prison and ask to see the great painting, “ The 
 Charge of St. Peter” at the end of the prison 
 chapel. 
 
 But the most wonderful thing about this won¬ 
 derful story is the influence of these years of 
 Christlike service by this good woman on some of 
 the prisoners. Take just one. A young boy, six¬ 
 teen, went out to target practice with a comrade, 
 twelve years ago. They got a bottle of liquor and 
 got drunk and quarreled, and one shot the other 
 and killed him. He ran away, was caught after 
 two years, and was sentenced for life. He has 
 
THE RESTORATION OF PETER 125 
 
 been in that prison now ten years. Under the in¬ 
 fluence of Miss Cowles’ work he, too, began to 
 paint, and through her Christlike spirit and the 
 influence of her great painting, has himself painted 
 the three crosses on Calvary. He has not great 
 ability as a painter, but he has found a great 
 Saviour on the middle cross, one able to save unto 
 the uttermost, who has filled his soul with hope 
 and courage. And I do not envy any one who 
 can read with a cold heart or dry eyes those won¬ 
 derful articles of Genevieve Cowles, telling of the 
 way God has used her pictures and her Christian 
 efforts to bring the Christ, who restored Peter, to 
 these poor prisoners. It has been sunlight from 
 Calvary and from Easter morning into many dark¬ 
 ened hearts. 
 
 Peter did not look as though he was worth sav¬ 
 ing that night when he bitterly denied his Lord; 
 but Jesus saw something in him that was worth 
 while, and by restoring Peter, made all the glory 
 of Pentecost possible. 
 
 Some of you may be in Peter’s condition. You 
 have sinned, as Peter did, against the tender 
 friendship and loving kindness of your Lord, and 
 by your worldliness and your cowardice, in the 
 stress of opposition to your Saviour, you have de¬ 
 nied Him and brought grief and disappointment 
 to His loving heart. But if, like Peter, you re- 
 
126 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 pent of your sin and turn again unto Him—He 
 who forgave Peter and restored him not only to 
 His love, but to His confidence, and who honoured 
 him with still greater trusts, and blessed his ef¬ 
 forts beyond all his dreams, will forgive you, and 
 honour you, and bless you with the great and 
 wonderful joy of winning other souls to your 
 Lord. Let Him now restore you to your place in 
 His heart and in the work of bringing blessings 
 unmeasured to your fellow men. How little Peter 
 dreamed of Pentecost at the lake's edge that morn¬ 
 ing when Jesus said: “ Feed my sheep.” So you 
 cannot imagine the glorious achievements Christ 
 has in His heart for you, if you let Him heal you 
 of your backsliding and restore unto you the full¬ 
 ness of His love and grace. 
 
 Like Peter, you denied your Lord. Now, like 
 Peter, come back to Christ and be saved. When 
 John whispered to Peter, “ It is the Lord,” Peter, 
 deep down in his soul, said, “ This is my chance,” 
 and plunged out into the lake and swam for Jesus. 
 And he found Him and found his restoration. 
 He found Pentecost and all his glorious life as 
 a soul-winner there at the feet of Jesus. Oh, back¬ 
 slider, away from Cod! This is your chance. 
 Jesus is near. Swim for Him now. He will meet 
 you as tenderly as He did Peter, and you, too, will 
 find restoration and heaven at His dear feet. 
 
X 
 
 THE OPEN SECRETS OF PENTECOST 
 
 “ And when the day of Pentecost was now come, 
 they were all together in one place.” —Acts 2: 1. 
 
 “And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit, 
 and began to speak.” —Acts 2: 4. 
 
 “Now when they heard this, they were pricked in 
 their heart, and said unto Peter and the rest of the 
 apostles, Brethren, what shall we dof And Peter 
 said unto them, Repent ye, and be baptized every one 
 of you in the name of Jesus Christ unto the remis¬ 
 sion.of your sins; and ye shall receive the gift of the 
 Holy Spirit.” —Acts 2: 37-38. 
 
 ^HE first secret of Pentecost may be found 
 P in that one word “together,” coupled 
 with the phrase “ in one place.” The 
 Bible declares that one good man filled with 
 the conscious presence of God can whip a thou¬ 
 sand ordinary men who are opposed to him, but 
 that two such men working together can “ put ten 
 thousand to flight.” Frances Willard used to say 
 that that word “ together ” was the sweetest word 
 in any language. Certain it is that a group of 
 good people, working to promote a noble cause, 
 
 multiply their power amazingly when they come 
 
 127 
 
128 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 together in spirit and in unity of purpose. Noth¬ 
 ing weakens the Christian Church so much as to 
 be broken into factions, so that they do not pull 
 together for the Lord’s work. Neither wealth, 
 nor culture, nor numbers, however desirable, can 
 take the place of oneness of spirit and devotion to 
 the great mission of the Church, which is to win 
 men and women to Christ. The resurrection of 
 Christ and His occasional meetings with them 
 afterward, and His parting from them on Mount 
 Olivet, and His assurance that if they tarried at 
 Jerusalem the Holy Spirit would come upon them, 
 had brought the disciples into very close fellow¬ 
 ship. They had elected a successor to Judas, and 
 had filled up their ranks and stood shoulder to 
 shoulder, and had drawn together, not only in 
 spirit and purpose, but came daily into close touch, 
 physically, in one place, so that they should feel 
 the added power of each other’s presence and 
 faith. When we would kindle a great fire for 
 Christ among men, we, too, must bring all our 
 burning souls together in one place, that our spiri¬ 
 tual fire may kindle upon one another and flame 
 aloft as a witness to our Lord. The psychology 
 of Christian power is the same now as on the 
 day of Pentecost, and if we would attract the 
 multitude to Jesus, we must bind our forces to¬ 
 gether. 
 
THE OPEN SECRETS OF PENTECOST 129 
 
 The second secret of Pentecost is in the coming 
 of the Holy Spirit upon the disciples, banishing 
 their fears and turning weak and timid men and 
 women into valiant heroes and heroines who were 
 dauntless in the face of opposition and peril of 
 any kind. 
 
 Fear is man’s greatest enemy. No man is de¬ 
 feated so long as he is unafraid. Science has long 
 searched for some drug powerful enough to banish 
 physical fear. 
 
 A wonderful discovery has recently been made 
 of a shrub or vine known as the “ Courage 
 Flower.” For many years the medical profession 
 has heard of Caapi, but only vaguely. Baron 
 Humboldt, the German explorer of the last cen¬ 
 tury, heard the natives of Brazil speak of a strange 
 potion which made the savages of the South Amer¬ 
 ican hinterland reckless in battle. A later ex¬ 
 plorer, Richard Bruce, saw the vine, with vivid 
 red blossoms, which his native guide called the 
 “ Courage Flower.” Weiss, another famous ex¬ 
 plorer, witnessed an Indian change from a craven 
 to a Hector after drinking a cup of liquid brewed 
 from the vine of the Caapi. Such stories from 
 South America seemed to men of science like fairy 
 tales, but as they persisted, and the need of 
 science for some means to rid man of fear was 
 very great, the scientific men kept saying, “If 
 
130 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 some way could be found to deaden the tortured 
 mind during an operation, as parts of the body 
 are deadened by the injection of anaesthesia, and 
 if this could be done without the use of ether or 
 chloroform—dangerous to the heart action—mil¬ 
 lions of lives might be saved.” 
 
 So, a while ago, Dr. H. H. Rusby, President of 
 the College of Pharmacy of Columbia University, 
 decided to obtain a sample of this wonderful vine. 
 So the expedition was sent out, at an expense of 
 
 /S'* - . fcV.V» 
 
 many thousands of dollars, into the unexplored 
 hinterland of South America. It is a wonder 
 land. Great serpents still glide through the for¬ 
 ests. Strange mammals roam the jungles. Beau¬ 
 tiful ferns tower to extraordinary heights. Exotic 
 flowers burst into blossom. It is the home of the 
 boa constrictor, and anaconda, the tapir, the bird 
 of paradise, the orchid, and the long-sought-for 
 Caapi,—The Courage Flower. 
 
 After almost intolerable hardships, the expedi¬ 
 tion found the object of its quest. Its leader saw 
 the juice of the Caapi vine in action on the savage 
 natives, and after struggles that cost the lives of 
 several men, after paddling many miles up strange 
 rivers, and crossing almost impenetrable forests, 
 fighting fevers and beasts and reptiles and the 
 points of poisoned arrows, he wrenched from the 
 savage wilderness a few pounds of the roots of 
 
THE OPEN SECRETS OF PENTECOST 131 
 
 the Caapi vine, the juice of which, given a man 
 before an operation, will make him laugh at death, 
 or given an expectant mother, may take her pain¬ 
 lessly through childbirth—the wonderful drug that 
 kills fear. In the realm of man’s physical com¬ 
 fort and life that is a very wonderful discovery. 
 It may easily prove to be the most wonderful since 
 the discovery of anaesthesia. 
 
 But it was a far more wonderful discovery of 
 the power and love and mercy of God in the ban¬ 
 ishment of fear in the higher realm of the soul 
 when the Holy Spirit came upon the disciples of 
 Jesus in that upper room at Jerusalem. This di¬ 
 vine Caapi, the courage flower of the soul, worked 
 differently from that of this magic South Ameri¬ 
 can drug. It did not banish fear by deadening 
 the mind to danger, but by opening the eyes of 
 the soul to the realities of the spiritual world and 
 quickening the soul consciousness to realize the 
 infinitely greater importance and value of spiritual 
 things as compared with the physical life. 
 
 The story of Pentecost is preeminently the story 
 of this divine Caapi, this divine Courage Flower, 
 of the Holy Spirit. You remember how timid 
 and cowardly the disciples had been. When Jesus 
 was arrested, they all forsook Him and fled. That 
 does not mean that they willfully deserted their 
 Lord, as did Judas, who betrayed Him; but only 
 
132 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 that they were thrown into panic by their fears, 
 and ran away. They were like green volunteer 
 soldiers, whose patriotism cannot be doubted, but 
 who cannot hold their nerves steady under fire. 
 So it was with these disciples of Jesus. These 
 fishermen and peasants were strangers to the sights 
 and sounds of the city, and when the stern Roman 
 soldiers came upon them with torches and swords 
 and spears in the Garden of Gethsemane, and led 
 away their Lord a prisoner, even the stalwart and 
 self-reliant Peter became a craven, and wickedly 
 denied his Master. 
 
 Now these are the same men, only a few weeks 
 later, with over a hundred others like them; men 
 and women who had known Jesus, who had re¬ 
 ceived mercies at His hands, whose souls had been 
 illuminated by the light of His face, but with the 
 same possibilities of fear and panic in their natures. 
 But when the Ploly Spirit came upon them, and 
 they were quickened and aroused to the realities of 
 the spiritual world, all fear was banished, and the 
 Divine Caapi lifted them above all fear of what 
 their enemies could do to them. They feared no 
 longer the face of man. They feared nothing but 
 to sin against God. Neither wild beasts, nor 
 wicked men, nor martyrdom, could turn them from 
 their course. Fear was gone. That is the first 
 great secret of Pentecost. The consciousness of 
 
THE OPEN SECRETS OF PENTECOST 133 
 
 the divine love so brought into power in the 
 soul by the Holy Spirit that it entirely casts out 
 fear. 
 
 But the Holy Spirit does more than banish fear 
 from the heart and mind of the speaker—it adds 
 unction and spiritual magnetism, which words can¬ 
 not describe, to the presence and voice and words 
 of the speaker. It took a great blundering fisher¬ 
 man like Peter, who never dreamed of being an 
 orator, and made him an evangelist of transcend¬ 
 ent power over great masses of men. It took a 
 hundred and twenty peasant people, who had been 
 timid and backward, and charged their stammer¬ 
 ing speech and even their tears with an electric 
 force that no one could withstand. It drew the 
 crowd to Pentecost as nothing else could have 
 done. It still draws wherever it appears. Wher¬ 
 ever, anywhere, in country or city, a company of 
 earnest people are on fire with the presence of the 
 Holy Spirit—there the crowd will come to see 
 them consumed by the holy flames. Let the word 
 go forth from any church that the Holy Spirit is 
 present with great power, that sinners are being 
 convicted of sin, that repenting souls are being 
 converted, and the multitude will flock thither. 
 Nothing is so interesting as life; and the higher 
 the type of life, the more interesting it is. There 
 is no life so interesting as the life of the Spirit of 
 
134 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 God working in the hearts and minds of men and 
 women. 
 
 The third secret of Pentecost is the personal 
 ministry carried on by the individual Christians 
 in the crowd. It was not only Peter and the 
 apostles who were filled with the Holy Spirit, but 
 every one of the company of one hundred and 
 twenty Christians were so conscious of the pres¬ 
 ence of God in their souls that each one of them 
 became a preacher of righteousness and a personal 
 witness to the power of Christ to forgive sins. 
 There must have been some wonderful testimonies 
 there that day. Think who were there: Mary, 
 the mother of Jesus, was in that crowd bearing 
 witness to her divine Son. Think what a testi¬ 
 mony she had to bear. What a mothers’ meeting 
 Mary, the mother of Jesus, could lead, and how 
 she could persuade them to believe on her Son! 
 Mary Magdalene also was there. She had an 
 Easter story that would convince any woman with 
 an open mind that Christ had power to burst 
 asunder the bonds of death and the grave. And 
 that poor sinful woman of the street, who went 
 uninvited into the house of Simon the leper and 
 washed Christ’s feet with her tears and wiped 
 them with the hairs of her head and won the for¬ 
 giveness of all her many sins, had a message for 
 
THE OPEN SECRETS OF PENTECOST 135 
 
 many a sad-hearted woman in that multitude. 
 And old Bartimaeus, who had once been blind, but 
 now could see. What a tale of Christ’s consider¬ 
 ation and mercy he had to tell! And Zacchaeus 
 had a tale for publicans and tax-gatherers, of a 
 night session in his own home in Jericho, that 
 would melt the hearts of other men in like position. 
 It may be the man of Gadara and his wife were 
 there to bear testimony to their home, once broken 
 by sin, but now remade in peace and joy. And so 
 on through that great crowd you could search out 
 a hundred and twenty preachers, each one with his 
 or her own individual story of Christ’s forgiving 
 love to tell to his neighbour, in that vast throng, 
 where the one question on every one’s lips was, 
 “ What can I do to be saved? ” 
 
 And the one answer everywhere given, from 
 Peter to Mary Magdalene, or Lazarus whom He 
 raised from the dead, or the leper who had been 
 cleansed, or the man who had carried home his 
 bed after Jesus healed him, was, “ Repent ye, and 
 be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus 
 Christ unto the remission of your sins.” To re¬ 
 pent is to quit your sin and turn from it. And if a 
 man repent and turn from his sins, Christ is will¬ 
 ing and able to forgive him and cleanse him from 
 all sin and unrighteousness. Pentecost can come 
 only by clear-cut, genuine turning away from sin 
 
136 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 to Christ. No man or set of men can get up or 
 work up a Pentecost. It takes a band of faithful 
 Christian men and women pointing sinners to 
 Christ, and an honest forsaking of sin on the part 
 of the sinner who hears the message, to bring 
 about Pentecost. 
 
 What are all the requisites for Pentecost? 
 
 First, a company of Christian men and women, 
 together, in one place, seeking to bear testimony 
 to our Lord and call the attention of those who 
 do not know Him to His power and willingness to 
 save. 
 
 Second, the presence of the Holy Spirit. His 
 presence in our hearts takes away the timidity and 
 fear that sometimes locks our lips in silence. We 
 can bear glad testimony to the fact that when we 
 were far from Him in sin, He sought us out, and 
 forgave us, and took us out of the miry clay and 
 set our feet upon a rock. 
 
 But Peter might have preached his fiery mes¬ 
 sage; the one hundred and twenty Christian men 
 and women, led by John, and Zacchseus, and Barti- 
 maeus, and Mary the mother of Jesus, might have 
 gone among the multitude telling their personal ex¬ 
 perience with the Lord with tongues all aflame 
 with the unction of the Holy Spirit; and the Pen¬ 
 tecost of salvation would have failed if the men 
 and women in the crowd whose hearts were 
 
THE OPEN SECRETS OF PENTECOST 137 
 
 pricked into conviction of sin had refused to yield 
 to the call from heaven. After all, it was the 
 yielding, repenting sinner that made Pentecost 
 possible. My friend, you who are away from 
 God, who are conscious in your conscience that 
 you are a sinner against divine love and grace, it 
 is at last put up to the door of your heart. You 
 have heard the message of the Gospel. You are 
 convinced that you are in the wrong. You are 
 persuaded that Christ is the divine Saviour of the 
 world. You have proved again and again that 
 you cannot save yourself. Again and again you 
 have determined to break the chains of evil habit, 
 and have failed. You do believe that Jesus Christ 
 has saved other men and women from sin, and 
 that He has power to save you. You are con¬ 
 vinced that He is not only able to save you, but 
 that He is willing to save you. There is only one 
 thing lacking, then, to complete Pentecost. The 
 friends of Jesus are fully united in their spirit and 
 purpose. They have united their prayers and their 
 loving devotion. The Holy Spirit is here. We 
 have felt Him in our hearts. He has touched our 
 lips with the live coal of His presence. He has 
 been felt by some of you in your hearts and con¬ 
 sciences. Will you complete Pentecost? 
 
 You have heard the divine message. You have 
 been pricked in your hearts. You have been con- 
 
138 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 victed of your sin. Will you yield? It was the 
 yielding men and women who crowded about 
 Peter and his comrades and said, “ Brethren, what 
 shall we do? ” who made Pentecost possible. Now 
 is the day of salvation. The conditions have not 
 changed since Peter’s day. Christ is still the only 
 Name given under heaven or among men whereby 
 we can be saved. Repent of your sin, and make 
 open confession of your faith in Christ, and you 
 shall receive the remission of your sins and enter 
 into the gates of the new life. 
 
XI 
 
 MERCY AND HEALING AT THE 
 BEAUTIFUL GATE 
 
 “Peter, fastening his eyes upon him, with John, 
 said, Look on us. And he gave heed unto them, 
 expecting to receive something from them. But 
 Peter said, Silver and gold have I none; but what I 
 have, that give I thee. In the name of Jesus Christ 
 of Nazareth, walk. And he took him by the right 
 hand, and raised him up: and immediately his feet 
 and his ankle-bones received strength. And leaping 
 up, he stood, and began to walk; and he entered with 
 them into the temple, walking, and leaping, and prais¬ 
 ing God .”'— Acts 3:4-8. 
 
 C HRISTIANS working in fellowship are 
 always more useful and have greater 
 power for good. One may be able to 
 chase a thousand, but two can put ten thousand to 
 flight. Peter and John were, perhaps, the eldest 
 and the youngest of the twelve immortals who had 
 had three years of precious fellowship with Christ 
 during the years of His ministry. They were old 
 friends from their fishing days, and one supple¬ 
 mented the other. Peter and John together were 
 more than twice as effective as either alone. 
 
 It was like Moody and Sankey at a later day, 
 
 1 39 
 
140 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 Neither of them alone was half as efficient in soul- 
 winning as the two were together. Some one 
 sings: 
 
 “ And as of old by two and two 
 
 His herald saints the Saviour sent 
 To soften hearts like morning dew, 
 
 Where He to shine in mercy meant; 
 
 “ So evermore He deems His Name 
 
 Best honoured, and His way prepared, 
 When watching by His altar flame 
 He sees His servants duly paired. 
 
 “ He loves when age and youth are met, 
 Fervent old age and youth serene. 
 
 Their high and low in concord set 
 For sacred song, joy's golden mean. 
 
 “ So when two work together, each for each 
 Is quick to plan, and can the other teach; 
 
 But when alone one seeks the best to know, 
 His skill is weaker and his thoughts are 
 slow.” 
 
 There is a divine value in the Scripture injunc¬ 
 tion that we assemble ourselves together to wor¬ 
 ship God and to increase our love for Christ. 
 
 This is true not only in our added power in fel¬ 
 lowship, but also in the added regularity it brings 
 about in our worship. Just as the healthiest peo¬ 
 ple are those who eat wholesome meals at regular 
 intervals, so you will find the world over that the 
 healthiest Christians, the men and women who are 
 
AT THE BEAUTIFUL GATE 
 
 141 
 
 most effective as the soldiers of Jesus Christ, are 
 those who are scrupulously careful to be faithful 
 and regular attendants at the stated and customary 
 meetings of the church. 
 
 Peter and John were on their way to regular 
 prayer meeting when this great opportunity came 
 to them to save a soul and greatly advance the 
 cause of Christ. Thomas, the doubting disciple, 
 had much sorrow because he was not at prayer 
 meeting when Jesus appeared to the others; so 
 Peter and John were greatly blessed on their way 
 to prayer meeting. 
 
 It is an exceedingly interesting story. It is a 
 week-day morning prayer meeting. It is a blessed 
 privilege and a glorious habit to start every day 
 with prayer. 
 
 “ Do not hurry in the morning 
 To the duties of the day; 
 
 Spend a little time with Jesus, 
 
 Reverently kneel and pray. 
 
 “ Constantly He longs to guide us 
 On our journey day by day; 
 
 Longs to bless us with His presence, 
 
 As we pass along the way.” 
 
 And when God blesses us, it means that we be¬ 
 come a blessing to others. 
 
 Peter and John, on their way to the morning 
 prayer meeting, drew near to the gate Beautiful, 
 
142 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 the principal entrance to the Temple, and there, 
 waiting, with the beggar’s whine and the beggar’s 
 expectant look, sat a man who had been crippled 
 and lame from the day he was born, and who for 
 many years had been carried by his friends and 
 set down in this place to beg alms. And as Peter 
 and John drew near, he asked an aim of them, 
 and they paused to look at him. The two friends 
 fastened their eyes on him together, and Peter, 
 speaking for both of them, said in a commanding 
 voice, “ Look on us! ” 
 
 What interest that must have excited in that 
 lame man’s mind. I venture that never in all the 
 years he had lain there had any one ever said 
 anything like that. He must have felt that some¬ 
 thing unusual was about to happen. I can see the 
 quickened, intense look growing in his bored, 
 weary eyes. And then Peter says: “ Silver and 
 gold have I none.” The eyes show a little dim¬ 
 inution of interest; perhaps there is nothing com¬ 
 ing after all—a beggar must have many disap¬ 
 pointments. But Peter goes on quickly: “ But 
 what I have, that give I thee.” The interest 
 quickens in the lame man’s eyes again. He won¬ 
 ders what Peter is going to give. And then the 
 wonderful thing happens. The voice of Peter 
 gathers in power and authority as he cries: “In 
 the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, walk.” 
 
AT THE BEAUTIFUL GATE 
 
 143 
 
 And he took him by the right hand, and lifted 
 him up; and immediately his feet and ankle-bones 
 received strength, and he, leaping up, stood, and 
 walked, and entered with them into the Temple, 
 walking, and leaping, and praising God. 
 
 Peter and John had neither silver nor gold, but 
 yet they were able to greatly bless this man. No 
 millionaire on earth could have blessed him as 
 much as these penniless Christian ministers were 
 able to do. 
 
 Dan Crawford, the veteran African missionary, 
 who wrote “ Thinking Black,” used to lecture on 
 “ The Glory of Doing Without,” showing how 
 much one can do, and gain, by working amid dis¬ 
 advantages and limitations. He illustrated this by 
 a story of a hunting expedition with an African 
 chief. They came to a thicket where it was 
 thought that a herd of deer were concealed. “ Do 
 you see any?” asked the chief. Dr. Crawford 
 looked through his spy-glass and said: “ I think 
 I can see two deer.” The chief, looking with his 
 naked eyes, said, “ I can see twenty.” 
 
 The lack of glasses had made him train his eyes. 
 Peter and John had no money to give away, but 
 they had come into such relation to God and Christ 
 and the Holy Spirit that they could give such 
 blessings as no money could buy. For forty years 
 this man had lain helpless; but now, at the word 
 
144 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 of Peter and through his hand, acting as does the 
 carbon in the electric bulb with relation to the 
 electric current, that power which is back of and 
 the source of the electric current passed to him 
 and healed him, both in body and soul. It is a 
 wonderful thing to be carbon to God's electricity 
 of the Holy Spirit to bless the world! 
 
 I have been reading recently the wonderful re¬ 
 search work of Thomas A. Edison, which led to 
 the discovery of the thread of carbon now used in 
 the glass bulb of our ordinary electric lights. The 
 great inventor tried all sorts of metals first, but 
 when the current became powerful, each would 
 melt and the light would fail. Then, at last, came 
 the discovery which led to the use of the delicate 
 fibre. But the thing that set my heart to beating 
 like a trip-hammer because of its wonderful spiri¬ 
 tual analogy, was that the thread of fibre that is 
 used must first give itself to the flame. It cannot 
 be used until it is itself consumed. Then it will 
 communicate the electric fire and light to the 
 world. It is like that with a Christian. He can¬ 
 not bring the heavenly fire to the heart of his fel¬ 
 low men until he has been consumed himself upon 
 the altar of God. It was because Peter and John 
 had themselves been consumed by the flame from 
 heaven, that God was able to send the current of 
 His healing mercy through them to the lame man 
 
AT THE BEAUTIFUL GATE 
 
 145 
 
 at the Beautiful Gate. We cannot lift others above 
 our own level. In the grammar of Christianity, 
 “To Be comes before To Do.” If we, ourselves, 
 are full of doubts, hate, evil tempers, bad passions, 
 we cannot impart courage, hope, love, or goodness. 
 The greatest tragedy of the Christian Church to¬ 
 day is in the attempt of cold, selfish hearts to 
 carry heaven’s current of mercy and salvation to a 
 lost world. We cannot kindle others unless we, 
 ourselves, are on fire from above. 
 
 “ O lead me, Lord, that I may lead 
 
 The wandering and the wayward feet. 
 
 O feed me, Lord, that I may feed 
 The hungry ones with manna sweet. 
 
 “ O strengthen me, that while I stand 
 Firm on the rock, and strong in Thee, 
 
 I may stretch out a loving hand 
 
 To wrestlers with the troubled sea.” 
 
 Peter and John did not heal the lame man’s 
 body or convert his soul through any strength of 
 their own, but through the power of the divine 
 Christ who was their Saviour and Lord. The 
 credentials of Christ are in what He does for men. 
 
 Professor Thomson, a brain expert, tells us that 
 the brain of the chimpanzee and orang apes are 
 exactly like the brain of a human being, and that 
 the human brain does not possess a single small 
 convolution which is not also present in the brains 
 
146 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 of the apes. Suppose now that some visitor from 
 some other planet should see these two man-like 
 beings. How could he know which was man and 
 which was ape? Only by what they could do. 
 The man could read and write, build houses, rail¬ 
 roads, transform a wilderness into a garden. The 
 chimpanzee could do none of these things. What 
 the man can do is the proof that he has a soul im¬ 
 planted by the Almighty and ever-living God. So 
 Jesus did works that man could not do. His mir¬ 
 acles were signs and proof that He was not a mere 
 man, but the Son of God in a far higher sense 
 than man is. 
 
 We do not need that kind of miracles to-day. 
 We see the supernatural works of the risen Christ 
 in what He has done and is doing in the world. 
 No other religion has done such wonders as Chris¬ 
 tianity is doing to-day all over the world. 
 
 Roger Babson, the greatest financial and statis¬ 
 tical expert living on earth at the present time, 
 has probed to the depths the causes of widespread 
 dishonesty in business in this present chaotic con¬ 
 dition following as an aftermath of the great 
 World War, and he says: 
 
 “ The need of the hour is not more factories or 
 materials, not more railroads or steamships, not more 
 armies or more navies, but rather more education 
 based on the teachings of Jesus. The prosperity of 
 pur country depends on the motives and purposes of 
 
AT THE BEAUTIFUL GATE 
 
 147 
 
 the people. These motives and purposes are directed 
 only in the right course through religion. In spite 
 of their imperfections, this is why I believe in our 
 churches, and why I am a great optimist on their 
 future. We stand at the crossroads. We must 
 choose between God and mammon. Materialism is 
 undermining our civilization as it has undermined 
 other civilizations. Unless we heed the warning in 
 time and get back to the real fundamentals, we must 
 fall even as the civilizations of Egypt, Greece and 
 Rome fell—and for the same reason. Statistics of 
 every nation indicate that true religion is the power 
 necessary for the development of its resources, and 
 for its successful continuation.” 
 
 The work of Jesus Christ is as convincing of 
 His divinity to-day to any open mind as in the 
 days when He dwelt in human form on earth. 
 Take this example: 
 
 Two neighbours, a Mr. Welch and a Mr. John¬ 
 son, living in adjoining houses, were talking across 
 the hedge which divided their front lawns. Mr. 
 Welch was an earnest Christian; Mr. Johnson was 
 inclined to be skeptical about the divinity of Chris¬ 
 tianity. In the course of their conversation John¬ 
 son said: “ Of course, no one believes in miracles 
 nowadays.” 
 
 “ That depends on what you mean by ‘ mir¬ 
 acles/ ” said Mr. Welch, thoughtfully. “ I be¬ 
 lieve in them, myself.” 
 
 “ You mean that you think that miracles oc¬ 
 curred in the time of Christ? They certainly do 
 
148 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 not occur now. Miracles belong to the age of 
 superstition, to the childhood of the race,” replied 
 Mr. Johnson. 
 
 “ I don’t know about that,” said Mr. Welch. 
 “ If you agree that a miracle is a change due to 
 supernatural power, I can show you a miracle to¬ 
 night, right here in this city. Will you go with 
 me and promise to look and listen with an open 
 mind without prejudice? ” 
 
 “ Surely I will.” 
 
 The two men met after supper that night, and 
 Welch took his friend to the very worst part of 
 the city, a section where Johnson had never before 
 been. They went into a little hall that was 
 crowded with a throng of men and women so 
 dilapidated in appearance that Johnson whispered 
 to Welch, “ What sort of a place have you got me 
 into? This must be a meeting of all the ‘down 
 and outs.’ ” 
 
 “ It is,” said Welch briefly. 
 
 After the leader had given out a hymn and 
 made a short prayer, a big man with a voice like 
 thunder rose and spoke. 
 
 For half an hour he poured forth a perfect tor¬ 
 rent of appeal to that roomful of lost men and 
 women. He begged, urged, commanded them to 
 come to God. 
 
 When he finished, a score of men and women 
 
AT THE BEAUTIFUL GATE 
 
 149 
 
 went forward, and that big man knelt with them 
 and prayed for them so tenderly that Johnson 
 found his face wet with tears. 
 
 When the meeting closed and Welch and John¬ 
 son went out together into the street, Welch said, 
 “ Well, you have seen your miracle/' 
 
 “ I grant," said Johnson, “ that I have seen an 
 interesting sight and heard a good talk, but where 
 is the miracle? " 
 
 This was Welch's reply: “ Nine months ago that 
 man you heard talk was a professional gambler 
 and thief. He has been in State prison six dif¬ 
 ferent times. He has spent a fortune in drink and 
 vice. To-day he is engaged in an honest trade. 
 He has abandoned all his old, evil habits, and every 
 hour he can spare he labours to redeem lost men 
 and women. He is a devout, prayerful man. I 
 say he is a modern miracle, as great as any Jesus 
 Christ ever performed. Could anything except 
 miraculous power make that man what he is to¬ 
 night? " 
 
 Johnson was silent for a few moments, and then 
 said: “You are right. I shall never disbelieve 
 in miracles again." 
 
 Thank God, the most wonderful miracle in all 
 history is being performed again and again in 
 every land where Jesus is faithfully proclaimed. 
 
 General Booth, founder of the Salvation Army, 
 
150 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 once in his early ministry had his little chapel next 
 to an iron foundry. These iron workers were con¬ 
 stantly seeing the red-hot iron converted into use¬ 
 ful instruments. They saw the same thing hap¬ 
 pening in a spiritual way in Booth’s chapel, and 
 they nicknamed it “ The Converting Shop.” They 
 saw there a great spiritual power that could take 
 hold of men’s lives and change them. They be¬ 
 came red-hot in heart, and then something divine 
 laid hold on them; and, when they came out, they 
 were different. 
 
 The Christian Church the world over should be 
 a converting shop to take hold on the common ore 
 out of this wicked world and fashion it into some¬ 
 thing useful and beautiful both for earth and 
 heaven. 
 
 The lame man at the Beautiful Gate had lain 
 useless for forty years, but now, healed in body 
 and soul, he became a useful and a happy member 
 of the community. But no doubt ever and again, 
 in the midst of his rejoicing life, he would think 
 with regret of those forty years of uselessness. 
 And so I want especially to appeal to young men 
 and women. Why not give your heart to Christ in 
 your youth, so that all your life you may to the last 
 limit serve God and bless your fellow men? Why 
 have another year, or even another day, of sin, or 
 idleness, or neglect of God and duty to recall here- 
 
AT THE BEAUTIFUL GATE 
 
 151 
 
 after? Make the best of your life that it is possi¬ 
 ble to make of it. 
 
 Come to Christ now with these words of hope 
 and confident prayer on your lips and in your 
 heart: 
 
 “ Just as I am, Thine own to be, 
 
 Friend of the young, who lovest me, 
 To consecrate myself to Thee, 
 
 O Jesus Christ, I come. 
 
 “ In the glad morning of my day, 
 
 My life to give, my vows to pay, 
 
 With no reserve and no delay, 
 
 With all my heart, I come. 
 
 “ I would live ever in the light; 
 
 I would work ever for the right; 
 
 I would serve Thee with all my might; 
 Therefore to Thee I come. 
 
 “ Just as I am, young, strong, and free, 
 To be the best that I can be, 
 
 For truth and righteousness and Thee, 
 Lord of my life, I come. 
 
 “ With many dreams of fame and gold, 
 Success and joy to make me bold, 
 
 But dearer still my faith to hold, 
 
 For my whole life I come. 
 
 “ And for Thy sake to win renown, 
 
 And then to take my victor’s crown, 
 And at Thy feet to cast it down, 
 
 O Master, Lord, I come.” 
 
XII 
 
 THE CONVERSION OF THE CHIEF 
 
 OF SINNERS 
 
 “ Faithful is the saying and worthy of all accep¬ 
 tation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save 
 sinners; of whom I am chief.” —i Timothy i : 15. 
 
 T AKEN in all its aspects, considering the 
 streams of influence that have followed 
 it, the conversion of Saul of Tarsus into 
 St. Paul is in my judgment the greatest and most 
 important event in human history since the resur¬ 
 rection of Jesus Christ. Paul was a man of first 
 magnitude. Some men have been great in mental 
 grasp, and others have been great in action. Paul 
 was equally great in thought and in the power to 
 carry his plans into execution. Paul was a provi¬ 
 dential man to lift Christianity out of Judaism— 
 a religion for the Jews only—up to the world 
 plane, and make it, as God purposed it, and as 
 Jesus declared it, a religion for all mankind. 
 
 To do this, Paul had to overcome the most bitter 
 prejudices the world has ever known. He had to 
 overcome the Jewish hatred for the Gentile and 
 the Gentile contempt for the Jew. To do this, you 
 
 would think, would require a man to be two men 
 
 152 
 
THE CHIEF OF SINNERS 
 
 153 
 
 at one and the same time, and that was practically 
 what Paul was. By birth he was a Jew, but by 
 citizenship he was a Gentile who prided himself 
 on his free Roman citizenship. 
 
 When Paul began his preaching of Christ, nearly 
 all the Christians were Jews, and Paul's great mis¬ 
 sion was to persuade these Jewish Christians to 
 give their Messiah to be the Messiah to the Gen¬ 
 tiles, and to persuade the Gentiles to accept a Jew¬ 
 ish Messiah as their Saviour and Lord. The only 
 way this could be done was by leading both Jews 
 and Gentiles up to the higher, broader plane of a 
 common humanity in the fatherhood of God and 
 the brotherhood of the human race. Men of 
 strong intellect are often as narrow as they are 
 strong; but Paul had a mind at once strong and 
 broad. As James Freeman Clarke said of him, 
 “ The mind of Paul had the energy of a mountain 
 torrent and the breadth of an inland lake.” He 
 had a zeal and enthusiasm that burned its way 
 through all obstacles, yet it was ever directed by a 
 mind that was calm and clear and rational. 
 
 Glance a moment only at his story, to get a 
 proper view of his wonderful mental equipment. 
 
 He was a Jewish boy, born in a Grecian city 
 renowned throughout Asia Minor for its literature 
 and elegant arts. Then he moved to Jerusalem, 
 where he went through the training of the Phari- 
 
154 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 sees, zealously observing all their strict ecclesias¬ 
 tical forms and regulations. No one ever gave the 
 religion of the Pharisees a more thorough trial 
 than Paul. Meantime, while he was having this 
 moral training as a Pharisee, his mind was being 
 developed under Gamaliel, the wisest and most 
 learned teacher of his time. It was this brilliant, 
 scholarly, intense Roman Jew who was brought 
 face to face with Christianity at the martyrdom 
 of Stephen, the first of the early Christians to die 
 gladly for his faith in Jesus. 
 
 Stephen was undoubtedly a young man of splen¬ 
 did mind as well as of a personality singularly 
 genuine and pure. He was brought before the 
 Sanhedrim charged with blasphemy against God, 
 against Moses, against the temple, and against di¬ 
 vine laws and customs. The defense, a condensed 
 account of which Luke has given us, is very clear 
 and strong. He showed that the temple was not 
 essential to true worship, since Abraham made a 
 covenant with God when there was no temple; 
 that God was with Joseph in the prison in Egypt, 
 when there was no temple ; with Moses on Mount 
 Sinai, when there was no temple; with the He¬ 
 brews in the wilderness, without a temple. There¬ 
 fore, Stephen argued that the temple might be de¬ 
 stroyed and the true worship, acceptable to God, 
 still go on. That he was not the one guilty of 
 
THE CHIEF OF SINNERS 
 
 155 
 
 \ 
 
 blasphemy, but those who had wickedly crucified 
 Jesus. 
 
 The presence and power of the Holy Spirit must 
 have been remarkably manifest in Stephen’s face 
 and personality as he spoke. In the hall of the 
 Sanhedrim adjoining the temple the seventy 
 judges, leading the people of the nation, sat in a 
 semicircle. Stephen, brought in by the officers, is 
 standing before them on trial for his life, and for 
 the great cause which is dearer than life to him. 
 As he spoke the inner radiance of his soul shone 
 forth, illuminating his face. It was what Joseph 
 Cook once called the solar look from “ the Sun 
 behind the sun.” “ Other things being equal,” said 
 Joseph Cook, “ Csesar’s eye goes down whenever 
 it meets and does not possess the solar look. The 
 veriest sick girl, with this solar light behind her 
 eyeballs, is more than a match for Caesar without 
 it. This radiance cannot be counterfeited, it must 
 have an adequate cause.” And as the members 
 of the Council looked on Stephen’s face as he 
 spoke, they were amazed before that solar look. 
 For instead of any sign of fear or dread they 
 “ saw his face as it had been the face of an angel.” 
 It was the Sun behind the sun. It was a divine 
 illumination from the presence of the Holy Spirit. 
 It was like Moses’ face when he had been forty 
 days on Mount Sinai alone with God. It was like 
 
156 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS" 
 
 the face of Jesus on the Mount of Transfigura¬ 
 tion. One would think such a manifestation of 
 God’s presence would have broken their opposition 
 and melted their hearts; but their prejudice and 
 hate resisted the divine influence and made them 
 hate him worse than ever. In one room of the 
 Palace of Light at the great Exposition at Paris, 
 there was a long row of peculiar mirrors, in which 
 you saw yourself in every odd, peculiar, distorted 
 fashion, except your one natural image. So these 
 men saw the statements and personality of Stephen 
 changed and distorted by their prejudice and 
 hatred. They were cut to the heart, and in the 
 devilish hatred of their wicked souls they rushed 
 upon him and fairly gnashed upon him with their 
 teeth, but instead of reviling them, he looked up¬ 
 ward with that glory face and exclaimed, “ I see 
 the heavens opened, and the Son of man standing 
 on the right hand of God.” 
 
 That was too much! They must kill him. They 
 stopped their ears, and lifted him in their arms, 
 and cast him out of the city, where they could 
 stone him to death; and as I see going with them 
 Saul of Tarsus, and when the awful murder is 
 under way, see him selected as master of the deed, 
 and see the men who are stoning Stephen first lay¬ 
 ing their outer clothes down at his feet while he 
 looks on with approval, while he gazes on Stephen, 
 
THE CHIEF OF SINNERS 
 
 157 
 
 who under that cruel shower of stones falls on his 
 knees and cries out to God, “ Lord, lay not this 
 sin to their charge,” and a little later, “ Lord 
 Jesus, receive my spirit”; I do not wonder that 
 many years afterward, when writing to Timothy, 
 Paul calls himself the chief of sinners. 
 
 Strange as it may seem, that horrible death of 
 Stephen was the first step in the conversion of St. 
 Paul. 
 
 At first the loss of Stephen seemed irreparable 
 to Christianity. The early Christians were scat¬ 
 tered to the four winds. But we may trust God 
 to take care of His cause. When, at a seemingly 
 critical moment, a man or a woman dies, we are 
 ready to cry out, “The loss is irreparable; that 
 man cannot be spared. That young mother, how 
 can her children do without her? That father, 
 the support of his family; that statesman, the tried 
 ruler, the one man in whom all trust, on whom all 
 lean.” So men talked when Phillips Brooks died, 
 and when Lincoln was assassinated, and when 
 Roosevelt went so suddenly. So it was when 
 Stephen was killed at the threshold of what seemed 
 a glorious career. “ So it was,” says Freeman 
 Clarke, “ still more, when Jesus went,—the one 
 Being in the world whom the world could not do 
 without; whose place no one could take. The 
 good and the wise, the pure and generous go; the 
 
158 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 souls of genius, the creatures of divine inspiration, 
 they go. And then God raises them up on high, 
 to look down on us from above, and be our in¬ 
 spiration. Their great lives and holy examples 
 inspire us to new effort. The memory of the 
 mother lives in her children’s hearts. When Jesus 
 went away. He came nearer to His friends than 
 He had been before. The sight of Stephen’s death, 
 the sound of Stephen’s voice, his face like that of 
 an angel, his cry of joy and triumph in the midst 
 of his agony, these were the first steps in the con¬ 
 version of St. Paul.” 
 
 At first Saul went on gloomy, sullen, more set 
 than ever to blot the very name of Jesus out of 
 the earth. Luke graphically describes it in saying 
 that when Saul went to the High Priest for letters 
 to Damascus he was fairly “ breathing threatening 
 and slaughter against the disciples of the Lord.” 
 
 And then it happened. Who can tell it so well 
 as Paul himself? Many years later, standing be¬ 
 fore King Agrippa, Paul said: “At midday, O 
 king, I saw on the way a light from heaven, above 
 the brightness of the sun, shining around about me 
 and them that journeyed with me. And when we 
 were all fallen to the earth, I heard a voice saying 
 unto me in the Hebrew language, Saul, Saul, why 
 persecutest thou me? it is hard for thee to kick 
 against the goad. And I said, Who art thou, 
 
THE CHIEF OF SINNEES 
 
 159 
 
 Lord? And the Lord said, I am Jesus whom thou 
 persecutest.” 
 
 That day this wonderful man ceased to be Saul 
 the persecutor, and became Paul the Christian. 
 
 Saul had been kicking against the goad ever 
 since the day he had looked on that man with the 
 angel face and heard his earnest defense. Oxen 
 were used in farming in Saul's day, and when the 
 rebellious oxen flung out their heels in angry pro¬ 
 test, they encountered a somewhat cruel device. 
 The team or shaft of the ploughshare was faced 
 with small, sharp iron spikes; and when they 
 kicked, they were painfully wounded. So Saul 
 had in his own memory and conscience, memories 
 of Stephen's defense, and Stephen’s face, and the 
 love and tenderness of his dying prayer, sharp 
 goads that kept him under continual conviction of 
 sin, so that when Jesus appeared to him with this 
 clear cut declaration, Saul felt the truth of Christ’s 
 statement and at the same moment was convinced 
 that Jesus was the Messiah, the Christ of God, 
 and Saviour of the world; the only one who could 
 forgive sins, and that he was a sinner in dire need 
 of forgiveness. And in that tremendous moment 
 he cried out, “ Lord, what wilt thou have me to 
 do?” 
 
 That was the great surrender. Saul’s salvation 
 was certain from that moment. The going on to 
 
160 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 Damascus, the coming of Ananias the saint to 
 open his eyes, all that followed was only incidental. 
 The great moment was when Saul, seeing his sin, 
 surrendered and said, “ Lord, what wilt thou 
 have me to do ? ” 
 
 How wonderful was that conversion! Saul, the 
 brightest young man of his age, was thoroughly 
 convinced of the divinity of Jesus and His power 
 to forgive sins. The change in him was complete. 
 Old things passed away, and all things became 
 new. He put off the old man with his evil deeds, 
 and he put on the new man, clothed upon with the 
 purity and love of Christ. All the turmoil and 
 strife and hatred that had been raging in his soul 
 was cast out, and he was filled with a great peace. 
 Every past ambition and purpose of his life he 
 threw away to become the witness to Christ and 
 His power to save. Long afterward he could say, 
 “ Yea verily, and I count all things to be loss for 
 the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus 
 my Lord; for whom I suffered the loss of all 
 things, and do count them but refuse, that I may 
 gain Christ, and be found in him, not having a 
 righteousness of mine own, even that which is of 
 the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, 
 the righteousness which is from God by faith/’ 
 
 How wonderfully Paul’s conversion stood the 
 test No test can be conceived that Paul did not 
 
THE CHIEF OF SINNERS 
 
 161 
 
 endure, and yet on land or sea, in sickness and in 
 health, among enemies or friends, Paul was the 
 steadfast, joyous witness to the Christ who ap¬ 
 peared to him on the way to Damascus. 
 
 A good many years ago I went down one sum¬ 
 mer day with a company of friends into that old 
 prison that used to be the dungeon under Caesar’s 
 palace, where Paul had his last days on earth; and 
 the tears of grateful love ran down my face as 
 one of our number read aloud to us the words Paul 
 wrote to Timothy in those days as he waited in 
 suspense for his martyrdom. “ For I am already 
 being offered, and the time of my departure is 
 come. I have fought the good fight, I have 
 finished the course, I have kept the faith: hence¬ 
 forth there is laid up for me the crown of right¬ 
 eousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, shall 
 give me at that day; and not to me only, but also 
 to all them that have loved his appearing. ,, And 
 we went up into the Italian sunlight, out of that 
 damp dungeon, asking God that we, too, might 
 make good as Paul did in the Christian race. 
 
 Some of you are kicking against the goad. 
 You, too, are under conviction of sin. You be¬ 
 lieve that you are sinners against God. You be¬ 
 lieve that Jesus has power to forgive sin, and that 
 salvation must come through Him. And yet you 
 are unsaved. Oh, I pray God you may follow 
 
162 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 Paul's example and surrender now to the Christ 
 who has appeared to you as surely as He did to 
 Paul, and who is as ready and willing to save you 
 and fill your life with untold usefulness and bless¬ 
 ing as He did his. As that midday vision on the 
 way to Damascus was always the great sunrise to 
 which Paul turned to gather courage and to get 
 evidence to reply to his enemies, so to-day may be 
 the great sunrise of your life if, like Paul, you will 
 now say, “ Lord, what wilt thou have me to do? ” 
 
XIII 
 
 THE CONVERSION OF A ROMAN CEN¬ 
 TURION AND HIS FRIENDS 
 
 “ While Peter yet spake these words, the Holy 
 Spirit fell on all them that heard the word.” 
 
 —Acts 10:44. 
 
 HE conversion of Cornelius and his 
 friends to the number of perhaps over 
 one hundred is one of the most wonder¬ 
 ful of all the stories of the spiritual conquests of 
 early Christianity. 
 
 If we judge from the centurions which appear 
 in the New Testament record, we would be forced 
 to the opinion that among the captains or cen¬ 
 turions of the Roman army at the time of the 
 ministry of Jesus, and the generation which fol¬ 
 lowed, were to be found men who were the very 
 flower of honour and chivalry. Prof. W. M. Clow 
 of Edinburgh says that the Roman Empire was 
 already in decline; but, like every great organiza¬ 
 tion, it had begun to die at the heart. And when 
 the pestilence of moral corruption had infected the 
 governors and counselors of Rome, there were 
 still to be found in the army men of fearless truth, 
 
 of fine courtesy, and of incorruptible purity. How 
 
 163 
 
164 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 the governors in the New Testament stand out in 
 contrast to the centurions described there! All the 
 four centurions are men of moral, even spiritual, 
 beauty. Of one of them the Jews said, “ He 
 loveth our nation, and hath built us a synagogue.” 
 And Jesus said of him, “ I have not found so great 
 faith, no, not in Israel.” Julius, another cen¬ 
 turion, described as “ The Centurion of Augustus’ 
 Band,” “ courteously entreated Paul, and gave him 
 liberty.” Another was the centurion who had 
 charge of the arrest of Jesus, and also was in 
 command on the day of the crucifixion, and who, 
 after watching Jesus die, said, “ Truly, this man 
 was the Son of God.” The fourth was Cornelius, 
 the centurion of the Italian band, stationed at 
 Caesarea. Cornelius is described by Luke as “ a 
 devout man, and one that feared God with all his 
 house, which gave much alms to the people, and 
 prayed to God always,” which was certainly a good 
 recommendation. 
 
 Perhaps some of you are saying, “ Surely a man 
 like that had no need that Peter should come and 
 preach Christ to him! ” But he did need just that 
 exactly. And best of all, Cornelius knew he 
 needed it. It is not enough to have a sincere 
 desire to be a good man. One may have that all 
 his life and still fail. Cornelius was one of the 
 sort of men Dean Farrar has called “ seekers after 
 
A ROMAN CENTURION 
 
 165 
 
 God ”; men like Socrates, Seneca, Epictetus and 
 Marcus Aurelius. But Cornelius knew that while 
 he was seeking after God, he had not yet found 
 Him. And the cry of his heart was like the cry 
 of Job: “Oh, that I knew where I might find 
 him! That I might come even to his seat! I 
 would set my cause in order before him, and fill 
 my mouth with arguments. I would know the 
 words which he would answer me, and understand 
 what he would say unto me.” Both in Job’s case 
 and in that of Cornelius, they felt it was not 
 enough to seek God; they must find Him, and 
 commune with Him. There are many men and 
 women like that in Christian lands now. All their 
 lives they have been influenced and restrained by 
 Christian teaching and sentiment. They even say 
 prayers now and again to God. In a vague way 
 they seek after God, as Cornelius did; but they 
 need to find Him in Jesus Christ unto their joyous 
 salvation. 
 
 This is a strange story of a prepared preacher 
 for a prepared audience. One day when Cornelius 
 was at his daily prayer, a strange thing happened. 
 His prayer was answered. There are many peo¬ 
 ple who would be as excited as was Cornelius if 
 their prayers were to be suddenly answered. 
 
 While Cornelius prayed, an angel stood beside 
 him in broad daylight and said: “ Cornelius,” and 
 
166 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 he was badly scared. But he was a brave, true 
 man, and after a moment he gathered courage 
 enough to ask, “ What is it, Lord ? ” and the angel 
 answered, “ Thy prayers and thine alms are gone 
 up as a memorial before God. And now send men 
 to Joppa, and fetch one Simon, who is surnamed 
 Peter: he lodgeth with one Simon a tanner, whose 
 house is by the seaside.” And immediately Cor¬ 
 nelius obeyed. He called two faithful household 
 servants, and to make sure they would not be held 
 up by the way, he sent a reliable soldier from his 
 own company as guard, and he opened his heart to 
 these three messengers and told them all that had 
 happened, and sent them away over thirty miles to 
 Joppa. It was before the days of autos or trolleys, 
 and the messengers went on foot. 
 
 In the meantime, the next morning Peter went 
 up on the flat roof of the house where he was stay¬ 
 ing to pray to God, and there a wonderful thing 
 happened. He went to sleep after prayer, being 
 very hungry and wishing dinner were ready, and 
 a remarkable dream or vision was given him. The 
 heaven seemed to open right over his head, and a 
 great sheet was let down before him out of the sky, 
 and in the sheet was a great herd of all kinds of 
 four-footed beasts and creeping things and birds, 
 and a voice said to him, “Rise, Peter; kill and 
 eat.” 
 
A ROMAN CENTURION 
 
 167 
 
 But Peter in astonishment said, “ Not so, Lord; 
 for I have never eaten anything that is common 
 and unclean.” And the voice answered in rebuke, 
 “ What God hath cleansed, make not thou com¬ 
 mon.” And this was done three times. 
 
 Now while Peter was reflecting on this wonder¬ 
 ful vision, and trying to understand it, the three 
 messengers from Cornelius knocked at the door 
 down-stairs. And the Holy Spirit made Peter 
 understand that they were messengers for him, 
 and that it was his duty to go with them, doubting 
 nothing. 
 
 So Peter hurried down the stairs on the outside 
 of the house, and astonished the messengers by 
 saying, as he greeted them: “I am he whom ye 
 seek: what is the cause wherefore ye are come? ” 
 And they told him their message from Cornelius. 
 
 Then Peter, beginning to understand the vision, 
 took them into his friend’s house and cared for 
 them over night, and the next morning went home 
 with them to Caesarea. Realizing, however, that 
 in going to preach Christ to the heathen, or Gen¬ 
 tiles, as they called them, he would be criticised, he 
 took a committee of six Jewish Christians with 
 him. 
 
 Cornelius was waiting for them, and, feeling 
 that it was a most important occasion, he had sent 
 out and invited in a great many of his relatives 
 
168 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 and friends, until there were probably over a hun¬ 
 dred waiting with him for the coming of Peter. 
 
 Poor Cornelius! He was a good man, but just 
 a poor heathen at best; and when he saw Peter, he 
 was so anxious and excited that he ran to meet 
 him and fell down on his knees before him in 
 worship. That shocked and embarrassed Peter, 
 who shouted as he grasped him by the hand and 
 lifted him up: “ Stand up; I myself also am a 
 man! ” 
 
 Then the two men stood and talked, and after 
 a moment Peter went in and saw the great com¬ 
 pany which had come together at the call of Cor¬ 
 nelius, and standing there before them all Cor¬ 
 nelius told Peter and his friends the story of the 
 angel who had directed him to send for Peter, that 
 he might know the way of life, and then turning 
 to Peter he said: “ Now, therefore, we are all here 
 present in the sight of God, to hear all things that 
 have been commanded thee of the Lord.” 
 
 Peter had an open field, and he went at it with 
 all his heart. His first words are historic: “ Of 
 a truth I perceive that God is no respecter of per¬ 
 sons ; but in every nation he that feareth him, and 
 worketh righteousness, is acceptable to him.” And 
 from that Peter went right on preaching the old, 
 ever new, Gospel of the birth and life and minis¬ 
 try of Jesus, of His death on the cross for our 
 
A ROMAN CENTURION 
 
 169 
 
 sins, and His resurrection from the dead. Re¬ 
 member, it is only a little while since Jesus’ death, 
 and it warms our hearts to see how sure Peter, 
 an eye-witness of His death and burial, is of His 
 resurrection from the dead. I can see Peter’s con¬ 
 fident face and flashing eyes as he shouts to the 
 assembled company in the home of Cornelius: 
 “ Him God raised up the third day, and gave him 
 to be made manifest, not to all the people, but to 
 witnesses that were chosen before of God, even to 
 us, who ate and drank with him after he rose 
 from the dead. To him bear all the prophets wit¬ 
 ness, that through his name every one that be- 
 lieveth on him shall receive remission of sins.” 
 
 It was the old Gospel, the Gospel you have heard 
 again and again ever since you were a boy or girl 
 in Sunday school. Man is a sinner. Jesus Christ 
 is a divine Saviour. Whosoever will may come to 
 Him through faith and find forgiveness of all 
 their sins. 
 
 We have only the barest outline of the sermon 
 from what Peter told Luke about it; but as Peter 
 preached Christ, the crucified and risen Saviour, 
 the Holy Spirit came upon the people, and they 
 all felt the power and presence of God. It was the 
 Gentiles’ Pentecost. And when the six Jewish 
 Christians who had come from Joppa with Peter 
 saw how God blessed these Gentiles who accepted 
 
170 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 Christ, and heard their happy testimonies, and 
 listened to them praising God, they were much 
 amazed, and not one of them could make any ob¬ 
 jection when Peter said, “ Can any man forbid the 
 w r ater, that these should not be baptized, who have 
 received the Holy Spirit as well as we ? ” So he 
 commanded them to be baptized in the name of 
 Jesus Christ. So you see Peter was more profita¬ 
 ble to Cornelius and his friends than an angel. 
 Dr. Arthur Pierson used to say: “ However poor 
 a preacher, I can preach the Gospel better than 
 Gabriel can, because Gabriel cannot say what I 
 can say, 4 1 am a sinner saved by grace/ ” 
 
 No wonder that the company of kindred and 
 friends who had found Jesus precious to their 
 souls under Peter’s preaching besought him to stay 
 with them a few days that he might tell them more 
 of the word of life. 
 
 Are there not some lessons in this story for the 
 Church to learn to-day? The truth that God is 
 no respecter of persons is still to be learned in 
 many sections. I have, myself, known a number 
 of churches where the laymen in control greatly 
 desired to have the church grow in membership, 
 but they desired to censor the list of applicants 
 according to their wealth and culture and social 
 position. I was on one occasion invited to become 
 the pastor of a large church that was thinly at- 
 
A ROMAN CENTURION 
 
 171 
 
 tended because the wealthier people who had built 
 the church and formerly attended it were now 
 moving away and an industrial population was 
 crowding in. When I had the official board to- 
 gether I said to them: “ Why did you ask me to 
 consider becoming the pastor of your church ? ” 
 One of the men present spoke up frankly and said, 
 “ We thought you would draw a large crowd of 
 people and fill the church.” 
 
 I replied: “ I can fill your church; but from what 
 I can see, I am sure you would be very much dis¬ 
 satisfied with me after it was full.” 
 
 “ Why do you think so ? ” he asked. 
 
 My reply was, “ Because the class of people you 
 desire to have it filled with are moving away. The 
 class who are taking their places are wage earn¬ 
 ers, who could never pay the price you have set 
 on your pews. If I were to become your pastor, 
 I should insist on making your pews free, and 
 should seek to fill them with the new crowd of 
 working people who are coming into this section 
 of the city. I can fill the church with those, but 
 when it is full, unless you have changed your 
 spirit, you would not be happy.” 
 
 I did not accept the invitation, and it took years 
 of unhappy experience before that church was wise 
 enough to learn Peter’s lesson that God is no re¬ 
 specter of persons and that the soul of a chauffeur 
 
172 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 or a grocer is as valuable in His sight as the soul 
 of a banker or a millionaire. 
 
 Revivals of religion have often failed and the 
 Spirit of God has been kept away from evangelis¬ 
 tic effort by attempting to select appropriate can¬ 
 didates for God’s grace. It is only when we fully 
 realize that every soul is as dear to the heart of 
 God as a son or daughter is to the heart of a fa¬ 
 ther or mother; is dear to Christ as one for whom 
 He shed His blood in atonement on the cross, that 
 we have really learned the great lesson of the 
 glorious spiritual victory in the house of Corne¬ 
 lius. 
 
 In my early ministry I had a friend, an earnest 
 young minister, who was deeply desirous of be¬ 
 ing a soul winner. He began a series of evangelis¬ 
 tic meetings, and the first night he asked sinners 
 to come forward in the meeting to be prayed for, 
 an old woman by the name of Jones and her rather 
 feeble-minded son were the only ones at the altar. 
 The spirit of the meeting seemed to congeal about 
 my ardent friend, and when the meeting closed, he 
 asked one of his leading men why the people did 
 not gather more earnestly to pray for seekers. 
 
 “ Oh,” said the layman, “ it was only the 
 Joneses again. Every time we undertake to have 
 a revival here, some of that Jones tribe lead off 
 and the respectable people keep away. There’s a 
 
A ROMAN CENTURION 
 
 173 
 
 whole raft of the Jones kindred down in the south 
 part of town, and if they cannot be kept away, 
 the meeting will be spoiled.” 
 
 My friend went home, broken-hearted. He did 
 not sleep that night. It was Saturday. He prayed 
 a great deal. At last on Sunday morning he went 
 into the pulpit and preached the best he could on 
 this story of Cornelius; he urged the people to 
 learn Peter’s lesson, that all souls were alike dear 
 to the heart of God and Christ, and at the close 
 called a meeting of his official board. He told 
 them of his sleepless night, of the agony he had 
 endured, that he felt that he would rather die than 
 not have a great revival of religion that would 
 shake the wicked town about them and save a 
 multitude of souls. Pie related the conversation 
 he had had, and finished by saying, “ Brethren, I 
 am convinced that our only chance for a great re¬ 
 vival of religion in this church and in this town 
 is for us to turn over a new leaf and give God a 
 fair chance to save the Joneses.” And he begged 
 them to join with him in an honest effort to reach 
 every member of the off-colour Jones tribe in the 
 whole town, and not to stop until every one of 
 them was converted. He was so desperately in 
 earnest that his burning zeal and his tearful pas¬ 
 sion for souls carried that whole group off their 
 feet, and on their knees with tears and prayers they 
 
174 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 pledged themselves to their pastor and each other 
 and God to save the Joneses. 
 
 That Sunday afternoon every member of that 
 whole Jones kindred, no matter how disreputable, 
 was visited and tenderly, earnestly, invited to the 
 evening service, and that night the young pastor 
 preached as never before, and the Holy Spirit fell 
 on the people as on that day when Peter preached 
 in the house of Cornelius, and not only a multi¬ 
 tude of the Joneses, but many others, including 
 some of the most respectable and influential citi¬ 
 zens of that town, found Christ and the forgive¬ 
 ness of their sins. That meeting ran on for many 
 weeks, and hundreds of souls were saved. Oh, 
 my friends, we must not seek to limit the grace of 
 God, or seek to grade souls. Man is God’s child. 
 “ Like as a father pitieth his children ” He looks 
 on the sorriest one of His family flock. We must 
 not count one of them common or unclean. 
 
 And is there not another lesson here that some 
 need to heed ? You are not a Christian. All your 
 life you have lived in a Christian land. Your 
 mother taught you to pray before you could talk 
 plainly. Your life has been hedged about and 
 held back from open wickedness by Christian in¬ 
 fluence and public sentiment. Like Cornelius, you 
 have supported good causes and kindly charities 
 with your money. If people were asked about 
 
A ROMAN CENTURION 
 
 175 
 
 you in the community they would say, “ He is a 
 good man,” “ She is a good woman,” but “ they 
 do not belong to the church.” 
 
 You believe that Jesus Christ died on the cross 
 to atone for your sins, and yet you have never said, 
 “ O Lord Jesus, I thank You! ” You have never 
 stood up among your friends and neighbours and 
 confessed that all the goodness you have, which 
 they have admired in you, you owe to Jesus. 
 When Christ’s friends have met to do Him honour, 
 you have never stood up in their midst and said: 
 “ I, too, honour Christ! I, too, confess Him as 
 my Saviour! ” 
 
 My friends, follow the example of Cornelius 
 and give Jesus at once your open love and con¬ 
 fession, and like him you will enter upon a joyous 
 experience unknown to you before. 
 
XIV 
 
 THE STORY OF A MIDNIGHT 
 CONVERSION 
 
 “Sirs, what must I do to he saved? And they 
 said, Believe on the Lord Jesus, and thou shalt be 
 saved, thou and thy house.” — Acts 16: 30-31. 
 
 HENEVER a preacher hits the sin 
 which is an important source of revenue 
 to some one in town, he is sure to hear 
 
 from the man or men whose bank account is being 
 filled from that sin. In the days when the liquor 
 saloons were still open, and were the greatest graft 
 in our cities, it was amazing what a furore could 
 be stirred up by an attack on the saloons, if it 
 went so far as to threaten to shut their doors or 
 cut off sales. The man who was renting his prop¬ 
 erty for the saloon; the gambler who had a con¬ 
 cession to fleece the unwary in the back room; the 
 white slaver, and the bawdy-house keeper, who 
 kept the open door to hell up-stairs or in the rear 
 ---all these, and others who had a rake-off from 
 the ill-gotten gains of the saloon, were up in arms 
 when that evil spider-den was threatened. And 
 they were all ready to join in browbeating or ston- 
 
 176 
 
A MIDNIGHT CONVERSION 
 
 177 
 
 ing the preacher who dared to expose the villainy 
 of that particular sin. 
 
 The same thing has to be met with to-day when 
 the war is waged on that Judas of modern civiliza¬ 
 tion, the bootlegger and the rum-runner. The 
 banker who lends him money and shares his profits 
 in blood; the newspaper which is bribed to be 
 blind; the politician who is promised dirty votes, 
 are all ready to cry out against the honest preacher 
 who fights for a sober, clean town. 
 
 It was like that when Paul and Silas came to 
 the old Roman town of Philippi to preach the 
 Gospel of Jesus. Spiritualism seems to have been 
 the peculiar sin of Philippi. And a young woman 
 who was at the moment the popular medium of 
 the town followed after Paul and Silas as they 
 were going to and from their meetings, and called 
 after them so much as to greatly annoy them; 
 until Paul turned and said to the evil spirit which 
 possessed the medium, “ Come out of her.” And 
 when this poor girl was made free from the evil 
 spirit, and was no longer devil-driven, she ceased 
 to tell fortunes, and to be a good money-getter 
 for the vicious men who had been exploiting her. 
 And when the money stopped coming in, they ifn- 
 mediately aroused themselves to get rid of the 
 preachers who had interfered with their profits. 
 They had Paul and Silas arrested and brought be- 
 
 i 
 
178 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 fore the police court, and then they organized a 
 mob to go to the trial and make a show of riot, to 
 scare the judges and insure the punishment of 
 Paul and Silas. After they had had them beaten 
 until they were nearly dead, they turned them 
 over to the jailer of the town and ordered him 
 to keep them safely. He, too, seems to have been 
 a hard-hearted politician, who, without sympathy 
 for their miserable condition, thrust them into the 
 inner prison, which was reserved for the most 
 desperate of prisoners, without food, or any at¬ 
 tempt to ameliorate their condition. And, indeed, 
 to emphasize his indifference to their sufferings, 
 he thrust their feet into the stocks. 
 
 I have often mused on the probable conversation 
 between Paul and Silas in that inner prison, a 
 conversation which led up to the happenings where 
 Luke takes up the story of the remarkable experi¬ 
 ences of the midnight. 
 
 I have imagined that Silas was inclined to be 
 depressed and very blue in his feelings as he lay 
 there on his poor bruised and bloody back, with 
 his feet so fast in the stocks that he could not 
 change his position for relief. I hear him say: 
 “ Paul, how long do you think we are going to 
 be able to stand this? I feel that this is about the 
 limit of my endurance. ,, 
 
 Then I hear the voice of Paul, resonant with 
 
A MIDNIGHT CONVERSION 
 
 179 
 
 courage and good cheer, as he exclaims, “ Cheer 
 up, Silas, these light afflictions, which are but for 
 a moment, shall work out for us a far more ex¬ 
 ceeding and eternal weight of glory! ” 
 
 Then I hear poor Silas answer, “ But, Paul, this 
 pain is very real, and I have not eaten since break¬ 
 fast, and the hunger is gnawing at my empty 
 stomach, and the pain in my bruised back where 
 the rods cut the flesh and the hunger in my stomach 
 seem very close together to-night/’ 
 
 But Paul comes back with cheerful voice, say¬ 
 ing, “ Don’t be downhearted, Silas. We have not 
 yet begun to suffer as Christ did. Do you remem¬ 
 ber how He was beaten until He fainted under 
 the cross on the way to Calvary ? Do you remem¬ 
 ber how they nailed Him to the cross, driving the 
 spikes through His hands and feet, and yet Pie 
 kept His courage and kindness and prayed for the 
 men that crucified Him, and how by refusing to 
 revile His enemies when they reviled Him He 
 won that dying thief to be one of His disciples? 
 Oh, Silas, what a glorious thing it will be if we 
 may so bear our cross here to-night with courage, 
 and hope, and faith, that God may give us some 
 souls out of this prison to rejoice over in that 
 great day! For, Silas, if we suffer with Him we 
 shall also be glorified with Him.” 
 
 And then I imagine Paul says: “ Silas, why not 
 
180 WONDERFUIT BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 have a season of prayer? That is what Jesus al¬ 
 ways did after a hard day; He sometimes prayed 
 all night.” 
 
 And then Paul leads in prayer. Paul was a 
 mighty man in prayer. The little brief paragraphs 
 of prayer found in Paul’s letters show great 
 versatility and power in his prayers. How he 
 must have prayed that night! I can hear him as 
 in the midst of hunger and pain he sincerely pours 
 out the thanksgiving of his great soul for the 
 blessed privilege of sharing in the sufferings of 
 Christ, and asks for God’s blessing on their 
 enemies. He pours forth his intercession for the 
 cruel jailer, prays that his hard heart may be 
 made tender, and that he and his family and their 
 fellow prisoners may be brought to repent of their 
 sins and be saved. And he pleads with God in 
 the name of Jesus that Silas and himself may 
 conduct themselves so cheerfully, and with such 
 gentleness and patience, that they may be made a 
 great blessing to the jailer and all others in the 
 prison, that he may not harm any one there, but 
 be a help and blessing to all. 
 
 Now, the jailer was on his way to bed after a 
 hard day when he was attracted by the sound of 
 Paul’s prayer, and he slipped back down the cor¬ 
 ridor to listen, and as he listened, his conscience 
 troubled him, and a strange wonder and fear took 
 
A MIDNIGHT CONVERSION 1SI 
 
 hold on him. “ Just listen to that! ” he says to 
 himself. “ I have had a good many prisoners 
 curse me for putting them in that dungeon, but 
 that is the first man that ever prayed for me for 
 doing it. He is certainly a new kind of man to 
 me. It must be a wonderful thing to believe in a 
 God like that, one who loves you, and hears you, 
 and answers you. He prays for me as though he 
 loved me and wanted to do me good, instead of 
 getting even with me. It makes me feel awful 
 mean. It was hard to put their feet in those stocks 
 with their backs in a fix like that. I am getting 
 to be a pretty hard man. What if their religion 
 is true? What if Jesus Christ, whom they are 
 preaching, did really rise from the dead, as they 
 claim? Justin, the centurion, who recently came 
 to Philippi, says he was in charge of the crucifixion 
 of Jesus, and he believes Christ was more than 
 man, that He was the Son of God, and that He 
 did really rise from the dead. What if he is right ? 
 What if these preachers are right? I have sinned 
 deeply to-night against this God Paul is praying 
 to, if they are right. But if they should get away 
 I would lose my head. A poor jailer is in a hard 
 place these days.” And so, worried in his con¬ 
 science and confused in his mind, and dead tired 
 with the work and worries of a long, hard day, 
 the jailer goes on to bed, and is soon sleeping 
 
182 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 the heavy sleep of a worn-out and exhausted 
 man. 
 
 When it comes Silas’s turn to lead in prayer, 
 he is ready with his appeal to God. He has for¬ 
 gotten the gloom that had depressed him. Paul’s 
 enthusiastic faith has been contagious, and his 
 heart has caught the fire from heaven, and when 
 Paul ceases he takes up the prayer, and they are 
 both so comforted by this communion with God 
 and Christ that their hunger and pain are over¬ 
 come, and when Silas has finished his prayer, 
 Paul says, “ Silas, cannot we sing something? ” 
 
 If they had had Rodeheaver’s favourite, I am 
 sure that right there in that inner cell of that 
 Philippi jail, with their feet in the stocks, they 
 would have sung, “ Brighten the corner where you 
 are! ” For that was just what they were doing. 
 For, as they had been praying, the other prisoners 
 in cells about them had been listening, at first no 
 doubt with sneers and insults, but as the pleading 
 with God for help changed to thanksgiving, and 
 they heard sincere pleading with God for them¬ 
 selves, and noted how, as the prayers proceeded, 
 the tone changed to joy and triumph, they were 
 deeply impressed, and down in most of their 
 wicked hearts there had been a feeling of the lone¬ 
 liness and barrenness of sin, and a rising desire 
 to have some relation to a God that would make 
 
A MIDNIGHT CONVERSION 
 
 183 
 
 such courage and joy as was shown by Paul and 
 Silas under such fearful conditions possible to 
 their own hearts. 
 
 But what will Paul and Silas sing? Hymn 
 books were scarce in Paul’s day in Philippi. There 
 are plenty of hymns now that would have been 
 appropriate. How Charles Wesley’s “ Jesus, 
 Lover of my Soul, let me to Thy bosom fly ” would 
 have fitted the situation that dark night! 
 
 Toplady’s 
 
 “ Rock of Ages, cleft for me, 
 
 Let me hide myself in Thee,” 
 
 would have answered all right. Or Theodore 
 Roosevelt’s favourite— 
 
 “ How firm a foundation, ye saints of the Lord,” 
 would have done, or 
 
 “ Onward, Christian soldiers, 
 
 Marching as to war ” 
 
 would have been fine—though they were in no 
 shape for marching just then. 
 
 There are plenty of songs now; but none of 
 these hymns of comfort and faith had been writ¬ 
 ten by a thousand years or more. Oh, I know 
 what it was Paul and Silas sang that night! I 
 have not a doubt of it. It was David’s precious 
 Shepherd Psalm, and it could not have been much 
 
184 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 different from James Montgomery’s sweet render¬ 
 ing of it. Just imagine how it must have sounded 
 to those listening prisoners as it rang down the 
 corridors of the jail at Philippi at midnight, rang 
 out in tones of gladness: 
 
 “ The Lord is my shepherd, no want shall I know; 
 I feed in green pastures, safe-folded I rest; 
 
 He leadeth my soul where the still waters flow, 
 Restores me when wandering, redeems when op¬ 
 pressed.” 
 
 I can imagine how astonished the other prisoners 
 were as they listened. 
 
 One listening prisoner says to his cell-mate: 
 “ What do you think of that? Those fellows are 
 in an awful condition. They are raw and bleed¬ 
 ing, they are held stiff in the stocks, so their backs 
 are kept to the cell floor; they are hungry and 
 half-starved, and still they sing! ” 
 
 “ Listen to what they say,” says the other, 
 “ ‘ green pastures.’ If they are in green pastures 
 to-night in that inner cell, chained to the floor, with 
 their bloody backs, what do you suppose it would 
 take to make a desert for them? ” 
 
 And just then came the earthquake. Were you 
 ever in an earthquake? If so, you had an inter¬ 
 esting experience, one you have never forgotten. 
 I was in a little one once. I was dressing in the 
 morning, facing the front window, with a row of 
 
A MIDNIGHT CONVERSION 
 
 185 
 
 shade trees in view, when suddenly that row of 
 trees grew wonderfully polite and bowed down to 
 me, and not to be outdone, I bowed down in return, 
 and the vase fell off the mantel, and all the world 
 seemed to be confused; but that was only a little 
 earthquake. This earthquake at midnight that in¬ 
 terrupted the song of Paul and Silas is described 
 as a mighty earthquake in a country where earth¬ 
 quakes were not uncommon. The walls of the 
 prison of Philippi reeled to and fro, and every 
 door flew open. Not only the doors, but the stocks 
 in the inner cell were shaken to pieces. The pris¬ 
 oners, confused and not knowing what had hap¬ 
 pened, came running together into the lobby or 
 common hall of the jail. The jailer had been 
 sound asleep, but the earthquake flung him from 
 his bed, and as consciousness came to him he was 
 in terror and despair. When he saw the jail doors 
 were opening, and heard the prisoners in their 
 excited exclamations in the lobby, he felt sure they 
 would all escape and he would lose his life. Those 
 were grim old days, and the jailer answered for 
 the safe-keeping of his prisoners with his life. So 
 the despairing jailer, fearing that he was ruined 
 and that only disgrace and death awaited him, 
 drew his sword, intending to commit suicide. 
 Then Paul came to the front. Paul was always 
 the leader wherever he went. When a prisoner 
 
186 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 on an Alexandrian com ship, when the storm came* 
 it was Paul who saved captain and crew. It was 
 now Paul who takes the lead and cries out to the 
 despairing jailer, “Do thyself no harm: for we 
 are all here.” 
 
 At that commanding voice the jailer gathers 
 his scattered guards, and when he has secured 
 lights, he comes to Paul and Silas, the men he has 
 so cruelly fastened in the stocks in the inner dun¬ 
 geon, in fear and trembling. Paul's conduct has 
 convinced him that the Gospel they have been 
 preaching in Philippi is true. No doubt his the¬ 
 ology is very vague and confused as yet, but he 
 feels that the way to salvation is known to Paul 
 and Silas, so he falls on his knees before them 
 and cries, “ Sirs, what must I do to be saved ? ” 
 How the hearts of Paul and Silas must have 
 leaped with joy and gladness then! God had 
 given them the victory. He had answered their 
 prayers. As Jesus won a soul on the cross, so they 
 were to win souls in their dungeon. Thank God! 
 Paul and Silas knew what to say to the jailer. 
 With one voice they shout: “ Believe on the Lord 
 Jesus, and thou shalt be saved, thou and thy 
 house.” And they went right on and preached 
 Jesus to the jailer and the whole company of 
 officers and prisoners, and many gave their hearts 
 to God and were happily converted, and were bap- 
 
A MIDNIGHT CONVERSION 
 
 187 
 
 tized in the jail that night as followers of Christ 
 Jesus. 
 
 But I want you to notice the wonderful effect 
 of the conversion of the jailer on his character 
 and conduct. When Paul and Silas were brought 
 to the jail, bleeding and bruised and hungry, he 
 offered them neither sympathy nor food nor min¬ 
 istry of any kind. He put them in the worst cell 
 in the prison, and put their feet in the stocks, and 
 went off to bed. But now that he has repented of 
 his sins and God has forgiven him through Jesus 
 Christ, see how differently he feels and acts. 
 
 He delays the baptism to minister to them. 
 He asks them to wait until he goes and gets a pan 
 of water and a towel and a bottle of oil. And I 
 see him as, with tears running down his cheeks 
 like rain, he washes the dirt of that dungeon cell 
 from their poor bruised backs and pours on the 
 healing oil and binds up their wounds and makes 
 them as comfortable as he can, and then, after he 
 has been baptized in the name of the Father, and 
 of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, he takes Paul 
 and Silas, not to the inner dungeon,—no, indeed, 
 —he takes them up-stairs into the family rooms 
 over the jail, and he hunts up the best food there 
 is in the house, and gets up the best breakfast that 
 jail has ever seen, and sets it before Paul and 
 Silas. He will not let the servants serve them; 
 
188 WONDERFUL BIBLE CONVERSIONS 
 
 he serves them himself in humility and love, and 
 urges them, with loving persistence, to partake of 
 food. 
 
 There is nothing in this world that will so melt 
 a hard heart and make it tender and loving as the 
 forgiving mercy of Jesus. No wonder Luke tells 
 us when writing the story that the jailer “ re¬ 
 joiced greatly, with all his house, having believed 
 in God.” 
 
 Thank God, the Christian religion is the religion 
 of joy. If you will forsake your sins here and 
 now you, too, shall lose your hardness of heart, 
 your sorrow and your fear, and you will find a joy 
 more wonderfully satisfying than you have ever 
 known. 
 
 Come to Christ! Leave all your gloom and 
 your fears at the feet of Jesus, and in His for¬ 
 giving love find the fountain of joy that shall never 
 cease to send forth streams of gladness and re¬ 
 joicing. 
 
 Printed in the United States of America 
 
HELPFUL SERMONS 
 
 JAMES I. VANCE , D.D., LL.D. 
 
 Pastor First Presbyterian Church-, Nashville, Tenn. 
 
 In the Breaking of the Bread 
 
 Communion Addresses. $1.25. 
 
 “A volume of communion addresses marked by deep 
 spiritual insight and knowledge of the human heart. They 
 are well adapted to awaken the spiritual conceptions which 
 should accompany the observance of the Lord’s Supper— 
 suggestions fitted for a communion occasion. The ad¬ 
 dresses all bear upon the general theme of the Lord’s Sup¬ 
 per and showed marked spirituality of thought and fervency 
 of expression .”—United Presbyterian . 
 
 TEUNIS E, GOUWENS Pastor Second Presbyterian 
 
 v " — .■* Church, Louisville, Ky, 
 
 The Rock That Is Higher 
 
 And Other Addresses. $1.25. 
 
 An unusually successful volume of discourses of which 
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 experience. As I have read it I have found my 
 
 conscience penetrated, my faith deepened and my hope 
 quickened.” 
 
 W. RUSSELL BOWIE , D.D. 
 
 Rector of St. Paul’s. Church, Richmond, Vo. 
 
 The Road of the Star 
 
 and Other Sermons. $1.50. 
 
 A volume of addresses which bring the message of 
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 immediate needs of men. The extraordinary distinction 
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 greet vigor of thought he has added the winged power of 
 an imagination essentially poetic. 
 
 JOSEPH JUDSON TAYLOR , D.D., LL.D. 
 
 Author of "The Sabbatic Question," “The God of War," etc. 
 
 Radiant Hopefulness 
 
 $1.00. 
 
 A wsssags of enheartenment, a word of cheer, for men 
 and women whose hearts have been fearful, whose spirits 
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 kind still finds itself faced. In this volume of addressee. 
 Dr. Taylor points the way to comfort amid confusion, to 
 peaceful harborage amid the prevailing storm. 
 
EVANGELISTIC WORK 
 
 OZORA H. DAVIS , D.D. 
 
 President Chicago Theological Seminary ,» 
 
 Preaching the Social Gospel 
 
 $1.50. 
 
 The new book by the author of “Evangelistic Preach 
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 latest work of President Davis’. 
 
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 Evangelistic Sermons 
 
 Edited and Compiled by Edgar Whitaker 
 Work, D.D., with Frontispiece. $1.50. 
 
 Strong, fervid gospel addresses, eminently character¬ 
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 seems to hear again the voice and compelling message 
 of one who while living preached to possibly as manf 
 people as any man of his generation, who “being dead 
 yet speaketh.” 
 
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 Author of" Thirty-one Revival Sermons* 
 
 The New Ten Commandments 
 
 and Other Sermons. $1.50. 
 
 Strong, stirring Gospel addresses reflecting the true 
 evangelical note, Dr. Banks’ latest volume, fully main¬ 
 tains his impressive, picturesque style of presentation. 
 Apt quotation, fitting illustration, drawn from literature 
 and human life give point and color to his work, which 
 is without a dull or meaningless page. 
 
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 The Magnetism of Mystery 
 
 and Other Sermons 
 
 Introduction by J. A. Marquis, D.D. $1.25 
 
 Dr. John A. Marquis says: “Dr. McKean’s sermons are 
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STANDARD REFERENCE WORKS 
 
 G. B. F. HALLOCK Editor of "The Expositor? 
 
 A Modern Cyclopedia of Illus¬ 
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 Nineteen Hundred and Thirty-eight Illustrations. 
 
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 Cyclopedic Handbook to the Bible 
 
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 Universal Bible Dictionary 
 
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PRAYER, DEVOTIONAL, ETC 
 
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 The King of Love 
 
 Meditations on The Twenty-third Psalm. $1.25. 
 
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 on both sides of the Atlantic, his splendid gifts are fully 
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 meditations literally breathe counsel and enheartenment. 
 
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 The Strategy of the Devotional Life 
 
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 Amid the vast life of a great city, the problem of sus¬ 
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 ity and difficulty. The “strategy” of the process as Dr. 
 Hough so ably calls it,. is discussed in the pages of his 
 new book, with convincing clarity. 
 
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 Thy Sea is Great—Our Boats Are Small 
 
 and Other Hymns of To-day. 50c. 
 
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 day aspirations not possibly finding utterance before. 
 
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 Prayers of Frank W. Gunsaulus 
 
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 **Dr. Gunsaulus was one of the most richly-endowed 
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