"THE MAN THAT DIED FOR ME"
For many years I wanted to go as a foreign missionary, but my way seemed
hedged about. At last I went to live in California. Life was rough in the
mining country where I lived, with my husband and little boys.
While there I heard of a man who lived over the hills and was dying of
consumption. The men said: "He is so vile that no one can stay with him; so
we place some food near him, and leave him for twenty-four hours. We will
find him dead sometime, and the sooner the better. Never had a relative, I
guess."
This pitiful story haunted me as I went about my work. For three days I
tried to get some one to go to see him and find out if he was in need of
better care. As I turned from the last man, vexed with his indifference,
the thought came to me: "Why not go yourself? Here is missionary work, if
you want it."
I will not tell how I weighed the probable uselessness of my going, nor how
I shrank from one so vile as he. It was not the kind of work I wanted.
But at last one day I went over the hills to the little abode. It was a mud
cabin, containing but one room. The door stood open. In one corner, on some
straw and colored blankets, I found the dying man. Sin had left awful marks
on his face, and if I had not heard that he could not move, I should have
retreated. As my shadow fell over the floor, he looked up and greeted me
with an oath. I stepped forward a little, and again he swore.
"Don't speak so, my friend," I said.
"I ain't your friend. I ain't got any friends," he said.
"Well, I am your friend, and--"
But the oaths came quickly, and he said: "You ain't my friend. I never had
any friends, and I don't want any now."
I reached out, at arm's length, the fruit I had brought for him, and
stepping back to the doorway, asked if he remembered his mother, hoping to
find a tender place in his heart; but he cursed her. I spoke of God, and he
cursed him. I tried to speak of Jesus and his death for us, but he stopped
me with his oaths, and said: "That's all a lie. Nobody ever died for
others."
I went away discouraged, saying to myself that I knew it was of no use. But
the next day I went again, and every day for two weeks. He did not show the
gratitude of a dog, and at the end of that time I said that I was not going
any more. That night as I was putting my little boy to bed, I did not pray
for the miner. My little boy noticed it and said:--
"Mama, you did not pray for the bad man."
"No," I answered, with a sigh.
"Have you given him up, mama?"
"Yes, I guess so."
"Has God given him up, mama? Ought you to give him up till God does?"
I could not sleep that night. I thought of the dying man, so vile, and with
no one to care! I rose and went away by myself to pray; but the moment that
I knelt, I was overpowered by the sense of how little meaning there had
been to my prayers. I had had no faith, and I had not really cared, beyond
a kind of half-hearted sentiment. I had not claimed his soul for God. O,
the shame of such missionary zeal! I fell on my face literally, as I cried,
"O Christ, give me a little glimpse of the worth of a human soul!" Did you,
Christian, ever ask that and mean it? Do not do it unless you are willing
to give up ease and selfish pleasure; for life will be a different thing to
you after this revelation.
I remained on my knees until Calvary became a reality to me. I cannot
describe those hours. They came and went unheeded; but I learned that night
what I had never known before, what it was to travail for a human soul. I
saw my Lord as I had never seen him before. I knelt there till the answer
came.