The case I am going to describe is not exactly that of John Newton, but it is
from his experience that I gather my picture. There is a young man with a
very good father, a holy father. As the young man grows up he does not like
his trade: he cannot bear it, no he says to his father, “While I succumb to
your government I mean to have my own way; other people enjoy themselves, and
so will I; and as I cannot do it under your roof. I will follow my fancy
elsewhere.” He goes to sea. When he is at sea he discovers that all is not
quite to his taste; the work he has to do is very different from what he had
been accustomed to; still, he doesn’t flinch. At the first port he reaches he
gives loose to his passions. “Ah!” says he, “this is a jolly life! This is
far better than being at home with my father, and being kept tied to my
mother’s apron-strings all my days. I say a merry life is the thing to suit
me, sir.” He goes on board again, and wherever the vessel puts in, each port
becomes an outlet for his vices. He is a rare boy to swear and drink, and
when he comes back to England he has no words too bitter to utter against
religion in general, and against his father’s scruples of conscience in
particular. It so happens that one day there comes on a dreadful storm. He
has to take a long spell at the pumps, and when that is over he must begin to
pump again, for the ship is ready to founder, and every man must keep hard at
it hour after hour. There is a driving wind and a heavy tempest. At 1ast they
are told that nothing can save them; there are breakers ahead, and the vessel
will be on shore! He lashes himself to the mast and floats about all night,
and the next day, and the next, with faint hope of life. He has some twitches
of conscience now; he cannot help thinking of his father and mother. However,
he is not going to be broken down by a trifle. He has a hard heart, and he
will not give way yet. He is crashed on shore, and finds himself among a
barbarous people. He is taken care of by the barbarians; they give him food;
albeit his meal is scant, and he is presently set to work as a slave. His
master proves harsh to him, and his master’s wife especially cruel. He gets
but little to eat, and he is often beaten. Still, he bears up, and hopes for
better days. But, half-starved and hard worked, his bodily health and his
mental energy are reduced to a low degree. No marvel that fever overtakes
him. Who has he to nurse him? What friend to care for him? The people treat
him as a dog, and take no notice of him. He can neither stir nor move. In
vain he pines for a drop of water in the dead of the night; he feels that he
must die of thirst. He lifts his voice, but there is nobody to hear him. To
his piteous appeal there is no answer. Then it is he thinks, “Oh! God, if I
might but get back to my father!” Then it is, when he is at the last
extremity, that he thinks of home.
Now what did happen in the case of John Newton will happen, and has happened,
in the case of many a sinner. He never would come back to God, but at last he
felt that it was no use trying anywhere else. He was driven to utter
desperation. In this dilemma his heart said, “Oh! that I might find the
Lord.” Hark, now: I will tell you a tale. A lot of sailors were going to sea.
When about to start, the owner said, “There! I have bought a lifeboat; put it
on board.” They reply, “No, never! We don’t believe in lifeboats; they are
new-fangled things. We do not understand them, and we shall never use one.”
“Put it on board, and let it bide there,” says the captain. “Well, captain,”
says the boatswain, “a tom fool of a boat-isn’t it? I cannot think what the
owner meant by putting such a thing as this on board.” Old tars, as they walk
along the deck say to themselves, “Ah! I never saw such a thing in all my
life as that! Think of old Ben Bolt taking a lifeboat with him! Don’t believe
in such gimcracks!” Presently a stiff breeze springs up, it comes to a gale-a
hurricane-a perfect tornado! Now let down the lifeboat, captain. “No, no, no;
nonsense!” Let down the lifeboat! No; the other boats are got out, but they
are stove in, one after another, and capsized. They bring out another; she
cannot ride out the storm. There she goes, right up on the crest of the waves
and she has gone over, bottom uppermost. It is all over with them! “What
shall be do, captain?” “Try the lifeboat, boatswain.” Just so; when every
spar is gone, when every other boat is washed overboard, and when the ship is
going down, they will take to the lifeboat. So be it. The Lord wash all your
boats overboard. May it please God to wreck your vessel; may he shiver every
timber, and make you take to the lifeboat. I fear me some of you will never
take counsel till you reach the crisis. May there come, then, such a storm
that you will be driven to take to Christ. That done there is no storm you
need ever fear. That done, let the loudest tempest roar, you are safe; you
have Christ in the vessel with you. Two or three more words, and I have done.
God has been pleased to give his dear Son, his only-begotten Son, to die a
most dreadful death, not for righteous ones, but for sinners. Jesus Christ
came into the world to seek and to save that which was lost. If you are a
sinned, you are the sort of person Christ came to save. If you are a lost
one, you are the sort of man that Jesus Christ came to seek. Let your present
sorrow comfort you, because it is an indication that you are the kind of
person that Christ will bless. Let your despair deliver you from despair, for
when you despair there is hope for you. When you can do nothing, God will do
everything. When you are empty of your own conceits, there is room for Christ
to enter your heart. When you are stripped, Christ’s garments are provided
for you. When you are hungry, the bread that cometh down from heaven is
provided for you. When you are thirsty, the water of life is yours. Let this
broken-heartedness, this terror, this alarm, this faintness, this weakness of
yours, only lead you to say, “I am such as Christ invited to himself. I will
go to him, and if I perish, I will perish only there”; and if you trust
Jesus, you shall never perish, neither shall any pluck you out of his hand.
May you trust him here and now. Amen.
“This article originally appeared here at Bible Bulletin Board.”
