“You are right, my child; and now can you tell me how does God melt hard hearts?”
“It is by his love.”
“You are right again, my child; it is the love of God that melts stony hearts. And it is by giving his Son to die for us that God shows his love.”
Here is a very striking story to show the power of the love of Christ in melting a hard heart. We may call it:
“Hope for the Lost.” Charles Anderson was the son of a sailor. His father was drowned at sea. Charles was left an orphan, in a seaport town in England. Having no one to take care of him, he got in with bad boys, and grew up an idle, careless, swearing, drunken young man. In a drunken spree one night, he and his companions broke into a house and robbed it. He was taken to prison, tried, and sentenced to seven years’ transportation to New South Wales. After his arrival there, thinking that he was unjustly punished, he became sulky, obstinate, and rebellious. He cared for no rules. He minded no orders, but did just as he pleased. For his bad conduct he was flogged again and again. But punishment did him no good. He grew worse and worse. He became so thoroughly bad and unmanageable that at last he was sentenced to receive three hundred lashes on his back, and to be chained for two years to a barren rock that stood by itself in the middle of the harbor of Sydney. The wretched man was fastened by his waist to this rock, with a chain twenty-six feet long.
He had irons on his legs and had hardly a rag to cover him. His only bed was a hollow place scooped out in the rock. He had no other shelter than a wooden lid, with holes bored in it. This was locked over him at night and removed in the morning. If he had been a wild beast, instead of a man, he could hardly have been treated worse. His food was pushed to him once a day, in a box, with a long pole. Sometimes people going by in boats, would throw him pieces of bread or biscuit. But no one was allowed to go near him or speak to him. Thus he spent two long years, a prisoner on that lonely rock. Of course, he grew no better, but worse, under such treatment. When his time was out, and he was released from the rock, he behaved so badly that very soon he was taken up again, and sent a prisoner to Norfolk Island, to work in chains for the rest of his life.
Now, what good could possibly be expected from such a man? None at all, if the same hard treatment had been continued towards him. But it was not continued. No, at Norfolk Island, he came under the care of a good Christian gentleman. This was Capt. Maconochie, an officer of the English army. He had great faith in the power of kindness and love. He found this man Anderson one of the very worst men he had ever met with; but he resolved to try the power of the gospel upon him. He treated him kindly, as one man ought to treat another. He got him to attend a night school which he had opened, and there had him taught to read. Then he persuaded him to join a Bible class which he taught. He showed an interest in him and sympathy for him. He often took him apart by himself and talked kindly to him. He told him of the wonderful love of Jesus, as shown in the story of the cross. This touched and melted the hard and stony heart of that desperate man. He wept like a child, at the thought of his life of sin. He prayed earnestly for pardon, and found it. Charles Anderson—the fierce, unmanageable man—the man who had been chained, like a wild beast to that lonely rock, became a Christian. And he was a thoroughly changed man in every respect. The change from midnight to mid-day, from mid-winter to mid-summer, is not greater than the change that appeared in him. From being an ill-tempered, gloomy, disobedient, idle man who was a plague to all about him, he became gentle, and kind, cheerful, obedient, and trustworthy; a man who gained the respect and the love of all who knew him. Capt. Maconochie got him released from being a prisoner, on account of his good behaviour. Then he took him into his own service, and a more useful and excellent servant he never had in all his life. Here we see the power of the love of Christ. And so when we think of the history of the crucifixion, let us remember these six things,—the place—the time—the manner—the witnesses—the wonders—and the words—which make up that history. And when we think of the lessons it teaches—let us remember the lesson of forgiveness—the lesson of duty to our parents—the lesson about the power and willingness of Christ to save—about the depths of his sufferings—and the wonders of his love.
We cannot better close this subject than with the words of the hymn we often sing:
“When I survey the wondrous cross,
On which the Prince of glory died,