let, they shall be white as snow; though
they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool,'" he said. "They stuck
to me, and rang in my ears and searched every nook and cranny of my
wicked heart. Often I had longed to be a Christian man for the little
dear's sake, if not for my own; but I said to myself, 'No, Derry Duck,
you are all pitch, you can't be made white;' and Satan helped me to hold
on to that way of thinking. Your scripture gave the lie again and again
to that. It seemed to say to me, _You_ choose blackness and damnation,
when God asks you to wash and be clean. What I've suffered these weeks,
no soul out of perdition can tell. The devil clung to me. He would not
let me go. He claimed me for his own. He told over to me my dark, hidden
sins, and taunted me that I had gone too far to go back now. He hissed
in my ear that no power could cleanse and save such as me. Then came up
the words, 'With God all things are possible,' 'Though your sins be as
scarlet, they shall be white as snow.' 'Christ Jesus came into the world
to save _sinners_.' And he has saved _me_. I am _His_. He has given me a
mouth to praise him. O Blair, think of his wonderful mercy, to take poor
wicked Derry Duck into the kingdom of heaven."

The boy's heart throbbed and swelled with joy and praise. What was the
changing of water to wine, or the calming of the stormy sea, compared to
this marvellous miracle wrought in a living human soul? "He to whom much
is forgiven, loveth much," said our blessed Saviour; and in Derry this
truth was abundantly verified. The Christ whose blood could wash such as
he, was a Lord for whom he was willing to suffer even unto death. The
mercy that could stoop to ransom such a transgressor, claimed an
affection before which poor Derry's deep love for his earthly darling
paled, as the things of time fade into insignificance before the things
of eternity.

Blair had longed to see his rude shipmates forsaking their sins; he had
prayed and wrestled in prayer for them. Yet now, when he saw the work
begun before his eyes, he felt the faithlessness of those very prayers,
and knew that they could have won no fulfilment, but for the merits of
the great Intercessor in whose name they had ever been offered.

"Why should it be thought a thing incredible to you that God should
raise the dead?" This question of the apostle comes with power to the
Christians of our own day. Do you really believe it _possible_ for God
to raise to new