93
March, 1945'
S HE WAS a ragged little girl in a fruit camp. She had never had a new dress in all her seven years. little brown feet were calloused and bruised and scarred. Her hair was a mass of tousled brown curls, very seldom combed. Her face was thin and brown, and not very .clean, but she had the most winning of smiles, and great laughing brown eyes. Her family had no home. All they owned they carried from onb camp to another in an old car with a small trailer-^a table, a few old chairs, and the |mattresses that were the only beds they had. They had a few dishes and pots and pans, and a washtub, which also served as the family bath tub. Their clothing was all hand-me- downs, and never fitted any of them. Looked at from the world’s way of judging, they were hopeless. Maisie came to the children’s Bible class in the camp, and from the very first day, she was interested. She lbarned the memory verses and did the handwork with joy and skill. One day the teacher said, “If any of you would like to ask the Lord Jesus to come into your heart, stay after the class is over, and we will talk about it.” Maisie stayed. She told the teacher, ‘“Ever since the first day when you told us that Jesus died on the cross for us, I’ve loved Him. I had never heard that before. Everybody ought to
A few hours later sad news came back to camp. The old car had been too slow to get out of the way of a fast car, and there had been a bad acci dent. Without any pain at all little Maisie had gone quickly to be with the Lord Jesus. All the people at the camp were very sorry about the accident and they were ready to listen when the minis ter, \yhom Maisie had liked, spoke simply of the Lord Jesus Christ who died for every one of them. A deep quiet feeling came oyer the whole camp, and many grown people and twelve of Maisie’s playmates received the Lord Jesus. In Maisie’s own family, every one who was old enough to understand accepted the Saviour, The father and mother had known about Jesus when they were children, but trouble had made them forget about Him. Now they were ready to love Him with all their hearts. “We will see our Maisie again,” they would . remind each other happily, “for she is with the Lord Jesus, and how we belong to Him, too.” “Yes,” one of her brothers would say, “when that accident happened, only one of us was ready to be with Jesus. Now all of us are.” Maisie’s life had been like an Easter bulb: small and unimportant-looking. But the Lord Jesus had made it grow and bear many blossoms: each one of them bright and fragrant for Him.
love Him for that. Of course I love Him.” She took her verses and her hand work home and tried to tell her mother about Jesus and His dying for her, but her mother was too busy with the smaller children to have much time for Maisie and her "funny notions.” She tried to tell her father about the Lord Jesus, but he was tired and discouraged and didn’t even anwser her; Her older brothers and sisters made fun of her and told her she was too young to get religion. But the little girl kept on coming to class, never missing a meeting, and *She never missed an opporunity to tell somebody in the camp about Jesus. She was such a sweet, happy child that everybody liked her. One day the news went around that Maisie and her family were leaving to go to another camp. Their old car was loaded to the top. Yes, even above the top the mattresses were piled and roped on. A loaded trailer brought up the rear, while a baby buggy perched dizzily on the front of the car. From every possible place bundles dangled, and out from between peerecf Maisie and the rest of the family, ten in all, packed in like sardines in a can. The whole camp was out to see them off. Some of the men said the old car never would hold out to the next camp. But there was nothing anybody could i do about it, so the family started out.
She had never had a pair of shoes. Her
Junior King's Business By MARTHA S. HOOKER # Member of Faculty Bible Institute of Los Angeles
Made with FlippingBook HTML5