"Well, now, let me tell you. I felt just so when I was a little girl, and a lady found for me a verse in the Bible which showed me that he prayed for me while he was here on the earth. Then I was glad. Listen:—Once when Jesus was praying, and had asked his Father to take care of his disciples, and keep them from sin, he said: 'And, Father, I do not pray only for these; I pray for every one who shall ever believe on me, because my disciples have told them about me.'"
"That means me," said Nellie, with a flash of intelligence in her bright eyes. "O Louise, that does mean me!"
"Of course it does, my darling little sister. Now, let me tell you what I said when I was a little girl, not much older than you. I determined that I would belong to Jesus all my life, and that I would try in everything to please him; and my papa taught me a little prayer to speak to him, telling him what I meant to do. This was the prayer: 'Here, Lord, I give myself away; 'tis all that I can do.' Do you want to give yourself to Jesus, Nellie,—to belong to him for ever?"
"Yes," said the child, with grave face and earnest eyes, from which the tears had passed, leaving only solemn resolve, "I do."
And they two knelt down beside the little rocker, and the rain pattered from the eaves outside, and the fire crackled in the stove inside, and aside from these sounds, and the low murmured words of prayer from young lips, a solemn silence filled the room, and the deed of another human soul was "signed, sealed, and delivered" to its rightful owner.
It was a radiant face that was raised to Louise a few moments thereafter, and the child's voice had a note of triumph in it.
"He took me," she said, simply. "I belong to him now. I did not understand it before; but it is very easy. He took me."
Could any elaboration make the story of the mysterious change simpler?
How do you think that older disciple felt about the matter of fruitage? Here had she been looking right and left of her for sheaves to take to the Master, and behold, just at her feet, a bud had grown and swelled and burst into bloom before she had even discovered signs of life! It taught her a lesson that she put often into practice among the lambs thereafter. It led her to remember that possibly his disciples of to-day often occupy unwittingly the position of rebukers, even while the Master's voice is calling, "Suffer the little children, and forbid them not."
Two hours thereafter they were down in the kitchen, Louise and Nellie; Louise had been called down by a message from a neighbour, and Nellie had followed. The errand despatched, the daughter-in-law lingered in the kitchen, her hungry heart looking for a bit of cheer.