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Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Jan 28, 1897

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 23, No. 4.

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FREE FORGIVENESS.

An incident related in the Presbyterian shows how free forgiveness and a token of love won a boy's heart, and illustrates the way in which God forgives every day the sins which we commit against his goodness.
A gentleman who had a house surrounded by beautiful grounds, was looking from his drawing-room one evening, when he saw a boy come across the lawn, evidently bent on mischief. He was trampling down the flowers, treading over the beds, and pulling down the branches from the trees.
The gentleman went down the steps, across the lawn, and before the boy had seen his approach, he had placed his hand firmly on his shoulder.
The boy struggled vehemently to escape, but his attempts were useless; a strong hand had secured him.
“Now, my boy,” said the gentleman, “answer me one question, Which is the best flower in this garden?”
The boy still struggled, but, finding there was no escape from the quiet eye and firm grasp of the man he had injured, he looked round, and after a few minutes’ pause, he answered, “That rose is the best,” pointing to a beautiful moss rose just bursting into bloom. The gentleman, still keeping one hand on the boy’s shoulder, reached out his other hand, and, plucking the rose in all its beauty, gave it to the boy, and releasing him as he did it, “There, take it, my boy,” he said.
The boy was amazed. Looking into the face of his strange benefactor, he asked, “Ain’t you going to have me punished, sir?”
“No,” was the reply. “I am giving you the best flower in my garden. You will never come and trample down my flower beds again, will you?”
“Never, sir, as long as I live!” was the emphatic reply; “but please, sir, ain’t there some little errand I could do for you?”
From that hour he was the willing servant of his friend. And many a time that boy would be seen, cap in hand, standing at that gentleman’s gate, with the loving petition on his lips, “Please, sir, is there any little job I could do for you?” You may be sure the request was not refused.
Have we not, as sinners, trampled down God’s holy laws, and grieved him many, many times? And how has he treated us? He sent from the throne of glory, Jesus, the only-begotten Son of God, “the Rose of Sharon,” and offers him to-day to a sinful world.