RECEIVE BY GIVING

Seventh-day Adventist Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Apr 15, 1880

RECEIVE BY GIVING.

Two travelers in a mountain-pass were overtaken by a snow-storm. As the night drew nigh they were still far from their journey's end; their strength failed rapidly, and their limbs became stiffened by the cold. Their suffering soon changed into a feeling of lethargy, and they were about to lie down, utterly exhausted, without a hope of rising again, when they stumbled against an obstacle lying right across their path, and half buried beneath the snow. They stooped down, and examining it, discovered, to their astonishment, that it was the body of a man. They touched it, and even they—cold as they were—could feel its icy coldness. Was it a corpse or a living body? They raised it from the ground, and upheld it in their arms; they breathed into its motionless lips; they chaffed its frozen limbs, and lo! it breathed—it moved—its eye-lids opened—its eyes looked upon them in wonder, and then in gratitude; the man was saved. Very weak he was, and still needing their help, and they bore him between them to their journey's end. Although they had not thought of it, they had saved, not only him but themselves also, for their exertions in his behalf had roused and warmed and animated them to active life again.

Christian brother, are you complaining that you are cold and feeble, and all but dead? Stop not to lament your weakness; your lamentations will only increase it. Go, help some fellow-traveler dying near you; bend over his fallen form in pity and in faith; pray for him, work for him, and you will, through God's grace, revive both his soul and your own.—Leaflet.