Free Bird

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  “. . . A light broke in upon my brain,—  It was the carol of a bird;  It ceased, and then it came again,  The sweetest song ear ever heard,  And mine was thankful till my eyes  Ran over with the glad surprise,  And they that moment could not see  I was the mate of misery.  But then by dull degrees came back  My senses to their wonted track;  I saw the dungeon walls and floor  Close slowly round me as before,  I saw the glimmer of the sun  Creeping as it before had done,  But through the crevice where it came  That bird was perched, as fond and tame,  And tamer than upon the tree;  A lovely bird, with azure wings,  And song that said a thousand things,  And seemed to say them all for me!  I never saw its like before,  I ne’er shall see its likeness more;  It seemed like me to want a mate,  But was not half so desolate,  And it was come to love me when  None ...

Saved by a Tract

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"Seeking something to while away his time, Hudson Taylor turned over a basket of tracts in his father's library and selected one that looked interesting. While reading it he was struck with the phrase, 'The finished work of Christ.'

Immediately the words attracted his attention. 'What was finished?' he asked himself. Reading further, the tract explained the finished work as 'A full and perfect atonement and satisfaction for the sins of the whole world.'

Then Hudson thought, 'If the whole work was finished on the cross of Calvary, and the whole debt of sin paid, what is there left for me to do?'

Hudson was thus convinced, as the light of God's truth flashed into his soul by the Holy Spirit, 'There was nothing to be done but to fall down on my knees and accept the Saviour and His salvation and praise Him forever.'

Hudson Taylor was seventeen years old at the time. He then went on to faithfully serve His Saviour for many years in China."

--Dr. and Mrs. Howard Taylor (From, Moments With The Book)

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