I have seen people smile when I use the word "supernatural" as the only fitting term to characterize a gospel. But such as smile have very smiling lives. The word--and all that is behind the word--has a very different meaning when laughter is banished from the lips, when the voice of joy is hushed, when some fateful sorrow falls and we can only stumble on through the encircling gloom. Such an hour came to me, filled with a bitterness worse than death; it was then I found my Lord anew. When the billows overswept and whelmed me I learned to pray; when the shadows closed in about me I descried the Divine Friend among them; when I lost my boy, and my father-heart was broken, I learned of One who gave His own Son, His well-beloved Son.
Let me revise my words. It was not I who "found my Lord"; but He found me--He and Helen--and they sought me hand in hand.
"That's the room," said Tim, panting from his haste, for the little fellow had led me at great speed; "there, d'ye see that light in the window--that upstairs window?"
I saw, and in a moment we were climbing a decrepit stair. Groping our way along an unlighted passage, my guide, still clinging to my hand, turned sharply into the squalid home. It consisted evidently of two rooms, the inner of which contained the couch whereon lay Tim's sinking father.
The boy never stopped till he had led me to the very edge of the bed. A few tattered covers wrapped the form of the dying man. His face, already conforming to the stamp of death, told the story of a lifetime's sin. Nobody could look upon it without reading there the tokens of a life of passion and excess. The heavy eyes looked up sullenly into my face as I stood above him.
"It's the preacher, Gus--don't," pleaded a woman who bent above him; for his lips were framing some word she evidently feared my ears would catch. "Don't, Gus--he's goin' to help you if he can; Tim fetched him--he's the preacher from the Hollow, an' Tim seen him last Sunday."
The man's set features seemed to relax a little as I took his hand. I hesitated as to how I should best begin--but he opened the way himself.
"I'm all ready for sea, boss," he broke out with a gasping laugh; "last voyage, looks like--an' nobody don't know the port. But I've got my papers, Cap'n--I've got my papers, an' I'll have to sail."