"I may."
"We don't want you. We won't let you in."
"How are you going to keep me out?" I asked. "There is the
invitation."
"We will put a policeman at the door."
"What is the policeman going to do with that invitation?"
"We won't let you in."
"Well," I said, "I will be there."
I gave them a good scare, and then I said, "I will compromise the
matter; if you two men will get down here and let me pray with you, I
will let you off."
I got those two rum-sellers down on their knees, one on one side of me
and the other on the other side, and I prayed God to save their souls
and smite their business. One of them had a Christian mother, and he
seemed to have some conscience left. After I had prayed, I said:
"How can you do this business? How can you throw this place open to
ruin the young men of Chicago?"
Within three months the whole thing smashed up, and one of them was
converted shortly after. I have never been invited to a saloon since.
"Too Late!"
At our church in Chicago I was closing the meeting one day, when a
young soldier got up and entreated the people to decide for Christ at
once. He said he had just come from a dark scene. A comrade of his,
who had enlisted with him, had a father who was always entreating him
to become a Christian, and in reply he always said he would when the
war was over. At last he was wounded, and was put into the hospital,
but got worse, and was gradually sinking. One day, a few hours before
he died, a letter came from his sister, but he was too far gone to
read it. It was such an earnest letter! The comrade read it to him,
but he did not seem to understand it, he was so weak, till it came to
the last sentence, which said:
"Oh, my dear brother, when you get this letter, will you not accept
your sister's Savior?"
The dying man sprang up from his cot, and said, "What do you say? what
do you say?" And then, falling back on his pillow, feebly exclaimed,
"_It is too late! It is too late!_"
My dear friends, thank God it is not _too late_ for you to-day. The
Master is still calling you. Let every one of us, young and old, rich
and poor, come to Christ at once, and He will put all our sins away.
Don't wait any longer for feeling, but obey at once. You can believe,
you can trust, you can lay hold on eternal life, if you will. Will you
not do it now?