BREAD UPON THE WATERS

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Oct 11, 1877

BREAD UPON THE WATERS.

A Christian mother received a heathen lad into her household to educate for Christ. Some of her friends, and, at times, even her husband, were inclined to consider it a visionary and unwise course thus to add to her already heavy family cares. Her reply was ever, “Our own son may yet want friends in a foreign land. Let us treat this heathen boy as we would wish our own son to be treated, should their circumstances be reversed.”

Time passed. The heathen boy left his adopted home, where he had won all hearts, for his missionary work among his own nation, where he now lives, laborious and useful, cheering the hearts in his old foster-home by tidings from his field of labor.

After a few years, this American son, prosecuting trade in a distant land, found himself near his missionary brother, who introduced him to men of influence and position who procured him opportunities for carrying on his business. It was the heathen boy with whom he had played in his childhood, now an influential missionary. But for him he would have been unsuccessful, and would have suffered from loneliness. The mother's words were realized. Her boy did find friends in a foreign land. The kindness she had bestowed was returned seven-fold.—Sel.