True, I was converted after I was forty years of age, but it was a bare chance. And oh, how hard it was for me. And if I had not had the most patient of friends to sympathize with me, encourage me and guide me, I should never have gotten along. I beg you do not follow my example in putting off your return to God.
Look at the men _whom you know_. How little interest they take in religion and their interest grows less and less all the time. The years have already come when they have no pleasure in the things of God. They have encouraged all their feelings, desires and ambitions but this, and this has almost died out. They have devoted all their thought and affections to making money and enjoying it, to seeking pleasure and enjoying it, to acquiring fame and enjoying it, and so their hearts are completely hardened and insensible to the religion which they cast aside ten, twenty or thirty years ago. And they will probably _never_ feel the all-absorbing interest in religion which is necessary to obtain it. Hence, they will go on blinder and blinder, colder and colder, more and more hardened down to old age and to the grave and to a hopeless eternity. I beg you, my young friends, all who hear me to put off your return to God not one day longer.
NOTE.--The address, of which this is the outline, was delivered on a Sunday-school occasion and is a specimen of Mr. Holcombe's talks to young people.--ED.
"And it came to pass, that, as Jesus sat at meat in his house, many publicans and sinners sat also together with Jesus and His disciples; for there were many, and they followed Him."
1. This class of persons _feel_ that they are outcast, and not recognized by those who are esteemed the good. Hence, they feel backward, and will not make advances toward the good for fear of being slighted.
2. If those who are looked upon and honored as good and pious and pure, will show that they _want_ to be friendly and sociable, it will take these persons by surprise, and will win their feelings--and this is nearly half the battle.
3. Besides, if the good, instead of waiting for these sinners to make advances, which they will not do, will take pains to show their interest in the welfare of these, their unfortunate brothers, it will make them believe that the pious are sincere, and not hypocritical, and that religion is a reality and not a mere profession. This is a great step toward gaining them. Most of this class believe in the Gospel in some vague sense, but it is too vague to amount to anything. But when they see the grand principle of the Gospel--_Love_--embodied in the Christian, and coming after them in their lost condition, it makes an impression, and it moves them to _action_. You can not drive men, nor can you convince them by abusing them and by shutting them out as too vile to be your associates. This only drives them further away. But all men have a chord in their natures that can be touched by love and kindness. It was this gentleness and sympathy that drew the thousands around John Wesley. It was this wonderful tenderness that made the publicans and sinners and harlots, the outcast and the low and the vile seek the company of the loving Jesus and press into His presence, even when He was the guest of the great and noble of His day. They knew Jesus would never repulse them--they knew He would love them, help them, save them.