“ Snow is one of God’s gifts to earth. And what a beautiful gift it is! See how softly the snow flakes fall — like bits of fleecy wooL If you could look at each one through a magnifying glass you would see a beautiful figure in the shape of a six-pointed star.” “Why—that’s wonderful!” ex claimed Peter. The next verse to be found was Isaiah 1:18, and because Grand mother and Peter found it at the same time, they read it together: “Come now, and let us reason to gether, saith the Lord: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow.” “ Peter,” said Grandmother as they finished reading. “ I believe this verse will lead you to that most precious treasure of all.” “What do you mean, Gram?” “ I will tell you. To begin with, our verse has told us that your sins are as scarlet. That means that they are like a certain shade of red which is almost impossible to remove from anything which it stains. Look at the snow. See how clean and pure it is! God wants your heart to be just like it. God knows that you could not take sin and its stain out of your heart, so He sent His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, to do this for you. If you will accept Christ as your Saviour, He will wash your sin away and make your heart clean and pure like the snow. Would you like to have Him do this for you?” Peter looked out of the window, and he was very thoughtful as he said, “ I’d like to have my heart white like that snow.” Then he slipped from his stool, and knelt beside Grandmother. When she explained to him how he could receive the Saviour, he asked the Lord Jesus to come into his heart, and wash away all his sin. Of course, the Lord Jesus an swered his prayer. Peter was so happy that he for got about going to the ranch. He had found the great Treasure, the Lord Jesus Christ.
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A frica
W E WERE DRIVING SLOWLY along the edge of the swamp, hop ing to see an elephant taking a bath or drinking from the green pools. Instead we saw something out on the open plain. At first it looked like a huge gray rock. Then we saw that it was a rhino. We drove towards it. The beast was lying down, fast asleep. We were able to get very close before he was awakened by the noise of our car. With a lurch, the big ani mal came to its feet and almost in the same motion was coming for us. We raced off, glad that the plain was smooth and the car didn’t stall. The rhino gave up the chase after about fifty yards and wan dered off, flicking his ridiculous tail. Rhinos are contrary crea tures, charging anything that an noys them, totally unafraid of the consequences o f a head-on colli sion. More than one car has been bashed in and badly damaged by three tons o f charging rhino. Naturalists say it’s because the rhino can’t see well that he charges anything he hears. His eyes may be poor, but not his ears, so he figures offense is the best defense. Now we drove back to where this big fellow was placidly wan dering along. He had forgotten that he had been excited about anything a few minutes earlier. As we again drew near, we no ticed something strange about this rhino. He didn’t look quite
right. Then we saw that he didn’t have any ears. There were just holes where the ears belonged. Now a rhino’s ears are large like trumpets, reaching out for every sound. A rhino without ears was odd-looking. We were tempted to laugh at the earless creature. After watching him for a few moments we drove off, still won dering what had caused the rhino to lose his ears. Some time later we reported to an African game scout that we had seen an earless rhino. He told us that he had seen it many times. In fact, he knew its his tory. This rhino had been born without ears. As we went on our way, we w ere thinking. It wasn’t the rhino’s fault that he didn’t have ears and looked funny. He’d been bom that way. We decided not to laugh at the old fellow. Sometimes human beings are bom crippled or hunch-backed, without a hand or an ear. They don’t like to be laughed at. We should treat them as normally as we treat other people. Christians are to be kind. This is a good place to practice our kindness. Such people need friends even more than others. This is true of anyone who has a physical or mental affliction. That afternoon we passed our rhino friend again. He was busy eating a bush. We waved at him but we didn’t laugh. He didn’t chase us either.
FEBRUARY, 1967
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