"No, dear; it was all about the soul, and how we were to be saved from sin. He said we must go in faith to Jesus, just as the poor woman did who touched Him in the crowd, or the blind man who cried to Him as He came out of Jericho. What we all wanted, he said, was to have our sins forgiven; and only Jesus can forgive sins."
"Yes," observed Jerry, who was well acquainted with the gospel narrative, "Jesus used to forgive the sins of those whom He cured. Do you think I am very wicked, Nelly?"
Tears were in the boy's eyes, and his sister stooped down and kissed him fondly as she answered, "No, that I am sure you are not, Jerry."
"And yet I must be," returned Jerry, "if it is sin that causes suffering, as you say the preacher said."
Ellen looked perplexed. "I am afraid I have not told it you rightly, Jerry, for I know he said we ought not to say of any one that because he was greatly afflicted, therefore he was a great sinner. If we did so, we should be like the Pharisees, who considered the man who was born blind a sinner. Don't you trouble yourself about that, dear. I am sure you are not very sinful."
Jerry sighed. "Is there nothing else you can tell me, Nelly?" he asked, after a pause.
Ellen tried to think of something that might comfort him. "I remember the preacher said that, whatever might be our sins and sorrows, they could not be beyond Christ's power to heal. Just as He could cure all manner of diseases when on earth, so now He can relieve all our wants, and help us in all our distresses."
"Did he say that?" asked Jerry eagerly.
"Yes, I think I have repeated his words correctly," replied his sister.
The boy's face took a more hopeful expression as he continued to turn over the leaves of the Bible which he held in his hand. After a while, however, he ceased to do so, and Ellen, bending over him, saw that he had fallen asleep with his finger resting on the passage which tells how as many as touched the Saviour were made whole.