Saved After Reading a Hymn

 BLJ: This might not have happened with modern 7/11 music, i.e. 7 words repeated 11 times!!!

SAVED AFTER READING A HYMN

Excerpt from the February, 1858
Primitive Methodist Magazine

JOHN RALPHS was born at Weston Heath, in the county of Salop, May, 1779. His boyhood passed away without religion; being a farm-servant, no doubt he imbibed the principles, alas! too often manifested among that class. Marrying about the year 1810, he removed to Lee Brockhurst, and for several years after he followed the course of this world, joining in its festivities and pleasures; he was regular in his attendance at the parish church, as many are at the present time, who put their trust more in that than in Christ. Hearing that a strange, but to him novel method of preaching was commenced by a few devoted men of the Primitive Methodist Connexion, whom God had honoured in appointing them to bring the lamp of gospel truth into this dark parish, about the year 1822, he visited their meetings, which were quite of a new character.

At one of those meetings God directed the arrow of couviction to his heart, and he found himself living without God and without hope in the world. He visited several places of worship, hoping to obtain peace of mind, but to no purpose. Hearing that a travelling preacher was going to preach at Hine-heath meeting-house, he resolved to go thither. He went, but left the meetinghouse much in the same state of mind as when he entered it; and he determined to go no more to any meeting, for he thought his was too bad a case for God's notice. While he thus brooded over his case, he drew from his pocket a hymn-book, and read that short but impressive hymn,—

"I'll look, perhaps my Lord may come;
If I turn back, hell is my doom;
If I ne'er find that sacred road,
I'll perish crying out for God."

Impressed with what he had read, he soon obtained the peace he had so long sought for. He at once devoted himself to God and his service, determining to serve his Divine Master though earth and hell combined against him; he counted himself the Lord's, and throughout a long life he endeavoured, by God's grace, to do his Master's will.

Soon after his conversion his name was put on the preachers' plan, and he shrank not from the work assigned him; but as a preacher and class-leader, full of zeal, laboured to the extent of his ability;—sometimes exhorting sinners to flee for refuge to the hope set before them; at other times encouraging the feeble saint. To all he made himself useful, always abounding in the work of the Lord; and in those times it was no small sacrifice, so far as concerns this world, for a man even to be called a Christian, as it pointed him out as a mark for the persecutors of the age.

He afterwards removed to Besford Wood, where he opened his house for the preaching of the word, and kept it open during the remainder of his life. Peaceful in disposition, gentle in rebuke, warm in exhortation, he was universally respected by men who differed from him in opinion; loving all Christians, of whatever name, as brethren in the Lord, he stood the brunt of the storm for many years. The Lord was with him, and he came through all his trials a better man than when he entered them. As a light in a dark and wicked neighbourhood he stood, and who knows into how many hearts that light graciously shone?

Persecuted by a godless world in his early efforts, he nobly bore the cross, despising the shame, His eye was firmly fixed on the prize of his high calling in Christ Jesus; firm in times of danger, he stood as a rock, impervious to the dashing fury of his worldly persecutors. Religion was sweet to him, it formed the climax of his devoted life; and when his sun began to set, he found that comfort in religion which only Christians can feel.

For several weeks before his departure, he was confined to his bed; being much weakened in body, his soul was still strong in the Lord. No doubts harassed his mind, he believed himself to be a child of God, saved through Christ, only Christ; full of hope, yet conscious of former weaknesses, his soul was cheered to the last by the bright prospect of soon joining the Church above, for which the Church below had been preparing him; and when the Bridegroom came, he found his servant with his lamp well trimmed and burning, ready to enter into the marriage-feast.

On 24th September, 1857 [at age 78], this good man was gathered into the heavenly garner, like a shock of corn fully ripe.

Pleasing is the life of such a man—fearing God, loving his fellow-men, devoting his talents and spare time to the great work of converting sinners to God. Henry Albert Price.