Moody's Anecdotes And Illustrations: Related in his Revival Work by the Great EvangelistMoody, Dwight Lyman
Religion
Moody's Anecdotes And Illustrations: Related in his Revival Work by the Great Evangelist
Moody, Dwight Lyman
Christian life -- Fiction; Homiletical illustrations
And that has been the story for six
thousand years. I got discouraged as I went through the prison, on, and
on, and on, cell after cell, and every man had an excuse. If he hadn't
one, the devil helped him to make one. I had got almost through the
prison, when I came to a cell and found a man with his elbows on his
knees, and his head in his hands. Two little streams of tears were
running down his cheeks; they did not come by drops that time.
"What's the trouble?" I said. He looked up, the picture of remorse and
despair. "Oh, my sins are more than I can bear." "Thank God for that," I
replied. "What," said he, "you are the man that has been preaching to
us, ain't you?" "Yes." "I think you said you were a friend?" "I am."
"And yet you are glad that my sins are more than I can bear!" "I will
explain," I said "If your sins are more than you can bear, won't you
cast them on One who will bear them for you?" "Who's that?" "The Lord
Jesus." "He won't bear my sins." "Why not?" "I have sinned against Him
all my life." "I don't care if you have; the blood of Jesus Christ,
God's Son, cleanses from all sin." Then I told him how Christ had come
to seek and save that which was lost; to open the prison doors and set
the captives free. It was like a cup of refreshment to find a man who
believed he was lost, so I stood there, and held up a crucified Saviour
to him. "Christ was delivered for our offenses, died for our sins, rose
again for our justification." For a long time the man could not believe
that such a miserable wretch could be saved. He went on to enumerate his
sins, and I told him that the blood of Christ could cover them all.
After I had talked with him I said, "Now let us pray." He got down on
his knees inside the cell, and I got down outside, and I said, "You
pray." "Why," he said, "it would be blasphemy for me to call on God."
"You call on God," I said. He knelt down, and, like the poor publican,
he lifted up his voice and said, "God be merciful to me, a vile wretch!"
I put my hand through the window, and as I shook hands with him a tear
fell on my hand that burned down into my soul. It was a tear of
repentance. He believed he was lost. Then I tried to get him to believe
that Christ had come to save him. I left him still in darkness. "I will
be at the hotel," I said, "between nine and ten o'clock, and I will pray
for you." Next morning, I felt so much interested, that I thought I must
see him before I went back to Chicago. No sooner had my eye lighted on
his face, than I saw that remorse and despair had fled away, and his
countenance was beaming with celestial light; the tears of joy had come
into his eyes, and the tears of despair were gone. The sun of
Righteousness had broken out across his path; his soul was leaping
within him for joy; he had received Christ as Zaccheus did--joyfully.
"Tell me about it," I said. "Well, I do not know what time it was; I
think it was about midnight. I had been in distress a long time, when
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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