But his text! What was James Chalmers' text? When he was eighteen years
of age, Scotland found herself in the throes of a great religious
revival. In the sweep of this historic movement, a couple of evangelists
from the North of Ireland announce that they will conduct a series of
evangelistic meetings at Inverary. But Chalmers and a band of daring
young spirits under his leadership feel that this is an innovation which
they must strenuously resist. They agree to break up the meetings. A
friend, however, with much difficulty persuades Chalmers to attend the
first meeting and judge for himself whether or not his project is a
worthy one.
'It was raining hard,' he says, in some autobiographical notes found
among his treasures after the massacre, 'it was raining hard, but I
started; and on arriving at the bottom of the stairs I listened whilst
they sang "All people that on earth do dwell" to the tune "Old Hundred,"
and I thought I had never heard such singing before--so solemn, yet so
joyful. I ascended the steps and entered. There was a large congregation
and all intensely in earnest. The younger of the evangelists was the
first to speak. He announced as his text the words: "_The Spirit and the
Bride say, Come; and let him that heareth say, Come; and let him that is
athirst come; and whosoever will, let him take the water of life
freely._" He spoke directly to me. I felt it much; but at the close I
hurried away back to town. I returned the Bible to the friend who,
having persuaded me to go, had lent it to me, but I was too upset to
speak much to him.'
On the following Sunday night, he was, he says, 'pierced through and
through, and felt lost beyond all hope of salvation.' On the Monday, the
local minister, the Rev. Gilbert Meikle, who had exercised a deep
influence over his early childhood, came to see him and assured him that
the blood of Jesus Christ, God's Son, could cleanse him from all sin.
This timely visit convinced him that deliverance was at any rate
possible. Gradually he came to feel that the voices to which he was
listening were, in reality, the Voice of God. 'Then,' he says, 'I
believed unto salvation.'
'_He felt that the voices to which he was listening were, in reality,
the Voice of God._' That is precisely what the text says. '_The Spirit
and the Bride say, Come._' The Bride only says '_Come_' because the
Spirit says '_Come_'; the Church only says '_Come_' because her Lord
says '_Come_'; the evangelists only said '_Come_' because the Voice
Divine said '_Come_.' 'He felt that the voices to which he was listening
were, in reality, the Voice of God, and he believed unto salvation.'
_The Spirit said, Come!_
_The Bride said, Come!_
_Let him that is athirst come!_
'_I was athirst,_' says Chalmers, '_and I came!_'
And thus a great text began, in a great soul, the manufacture of a great
history.