“The parsonage at Epworth, England, caught fire one night, and all the residents were rescued except one son. The boy came to a window, and was brought safely to the ground by two farm-hands, one standing on the shoulder of the other. The boy was John Wesley.”

Can the consequences of that action be measured? How would this world have been different if Wesley had died in that fire? How many millions of Methodists today look back to John Wesley as the founder of their denomination? That might be a good measurement of the consequences of that one action centuries ago.

Only God can measure the consequences of your actions today. Make them count.

When a man has a broken arm, the surgeon must find out the exact spot where the fracture is. He feels along and presses gently with his fingers. “Is it there?” “No.”

“Is it there?” “No.”

Presently, when the surgeon touches another spot, “Ouch!” says the man. He has found the broken part, and it hurts.

It is one thing to hear a man preach down other people’s sins. Men will say, “That is splendid,” and will want all their friends to go and hear the preacher. But, let him touch on their individual sin, and declare, as Nathan did to David, “Thou art the man,” and they say, “I do not like that.” The preacher has touched a sore place.

You can always recognize the broken area of your life, because it hurts when the Word of God touches it.

“I was once preaching in Chicago, and a woman who was nearly out of her mind came to me. You know there are some people who mock at religious meetings, and say that religion drives people mad. It is sin that drives people mad. It is the want of Christ that sinks people into despair.

This was the woman’s story:

She had a family of children. One of her neighbors had died, and her husband had brought home a little child. She said, “I don’t want the child,” but her husband said, “You must take it and look after it.” She said she had enough to do with her own, and she told her husband to take that child away. But he would not. She confessed that she tried to starve the child, but it lingered on. One night it cried all night; I suppose it wanted food. At last she took the clothes and threw them over the child and smothered it. No one saw her; no one knew anything about it. The child was buried. Years had passed away, and she said:

“I hear the voice of that child day and night. It has driven me nearly mad.”

No one saw the act; but God saw it, and this retribution followed it. History is full of these things.”

Guilt will destroy us. Take your guilt to the cross and find God’s peace.

“I heard of a boy who stole a cannon-ball from a navy-yard. He watched his opportunity, sneaked into the yard, and secured it. But when he had it, he hardly knew what to do with it. It was heavy, and too large to conceal in his pocket, so he had to put it under his hat. When he got home with it, he dared not show it to his parents, because it would have led at once to his detection. He said in later years it was the last thing he ever stole.”

When I was a boy, some friends of mine talked me into joining them in breaking into a house. We obtained a hammer, screwdriver and crowbar and walked across the street and around behind the house, trying to gain access through a back window. The house was empty, so there was nothing to steal. It was broad daylight and my friend’s father saw us going across the street, so he followed us.

He grounded his son and sent our other friend and I home. I was the oldest of the three, so he assumed I was the instigator. I was forbidden to play with my friend or visit in his home. Although that was years ago and I have since officiated at both of my friend’s parents’ funerals, to this very day I carry a shame for being identified in that act.

Tell us about your experience with stealing or with guilt.

“A steamboat was stranded in the Mississippi River and the captain could not get her off. Eventually a hard-looking fellow came on board, and said, “Captain, I understand you want a pilot to take you out of this difficulty?”

The captain said, “Are you a pilot?” “Well, they call me one,” he replied.

“Do you know where the snags and sand-bars are?” “No, sir,” came the reply.

“Well, how do you expect to take me out of here if you don’t know where the snags and sand-bars are?”

“I know where they ain’t!” was the reply.”

Moody concluded: “Beware of temptations. “Lead us not into temptation,” our Lord taught us to pray; and again he said, “Watch and pray, lest ye enter into temptation.” We are weak and sinful by nature, and it is a good deal better for us to pray for deliverance rather than to run into temptation and then pray for the strength to resist.”

I say that’s good counsel. What do you say in response to the story?

“When President Lincoln signed the proclamation of emancipation, copies of it were sent to all points along the Northern line, where they were posted. Now, supposing a slave should have seen a copy of that proclamation and should have learned its contents. He might have known the fact, he might have assented to its justice, but if he had still continued to serve his old master as a slave, his faith in the document would not have amounted to anything.

And so it is with us. A mere knowledge of the historical events of Christ’s life, or a simple intellectual assent to His teachings and His mission, will be of no help in a man’s life unless he adds to them a trustful surrender to the Lord’s loving kindness.”

That was a current-event method to teach about the freedom we have in Christ. Could you illustrate it better?

“A little nephew of mine, a few years ago, took my Bible and threw it down on the floor. His mother said, “Charlie, pick up uncle’s Bible.” The little fellow said he would not. “Charlie, do you know what that word means?” She soon found out that he did, and that he was not going to pick up the Book. His will had come right up against his mother’s will.

I began to be quite interested in the struggle; I knew if she did not break his will, he would some day break her heart. She repeated, “Charlie, go and pick up uncle’s Bible, and put it on the table.” The little fellow said he could not do it. “I will punish you if you do not.”

He saw a strange look in her eye, and the matter began to get serious. He did not want to be punished, and he knew his mother would punish him if he did not lift the Bible. So he straightened every bone and muscle in him, and he said he could not do it. I really believe the little fellow had reasoned himself into the belief that he could not do it.

His mother knew he was only deceiving himself, so she kept him right to the point. At last he went down, put both his arms around the Bible, and tugged away at it; but he still said he could not do it. The truth was – he did not want to. He got up again without lifting it.

The mother said, “Charlie, I am not going to talk to you any more. This matter has to be settled; pick up that Bible, or I will punish you.” At last she broke his will, and then he found it as easy as it is for me to turn my hand. He picked up the Bible, and laid it on the table.

So it is with the sinner; if you are really willing to take the Water of Life, YOU CAN DO IT.

“Out in the Western country, in the autumn, when men go hunting, and there has not been any rain for months, sometimes the prairie grass catches fire, and there comes up a very strong wind, and the flames just roll along twenty feet high, and travel at the rate of thirty or forty miles an hour, consuming man and beast. When the hunters see it coming, what do they do? They know they cannot run as fast as the fire can run. Not the fleetest horse can escape. They just take a match and light the grass around them, and let the flames sweep, and then they get into the burnt district and stand safe. They hear the flames roar as they come along, they see death coming toward them, but they do not fear, they do not tremble, because the fire has swept over the place where they are, and there is no danger. There is nothing for the fire to burn.

“There is one mountain that the wrath of God has swept over – that is, Mount Calvary; and the fire spent its fury upon the bosom of the Son of God. Take your stand by the cross, and you will be safe for time and eternity.”

“One dark night, a train was thrown off the track, and several were killed. This man was suspected, was tried and found guilty, and was sent to the penitentiary for life. The farm was soon cut up into city lots, and the man became a millionaire, but he got no benefit from it.

“It may not have taken him more than an hour to lay the obstruction on the railroad, but he was over thirty years reaping the result of that one act!”

“Here’s an example of Moody’s style: “I tell you the true sheep know a true shepherd. I got up in Scotland once and quoted a passage of Scripture a little different from what it was in the Bible, and an old woman crept up and said, ‘Mr. Moody, you said…’ I might make forty misquotations in an ordinary audience, and no one would tell me about them.

“Like two lawyers: one said in court that the other didn’t know the Lord’s Prayer. The other said he did: ‘Now I lay me down to sleep.’

“‘Well,’ the first said, ‘I give up. I didn’t think you knew it.’

“Didn’t either one of them know it, you see.”