Witnessing With Tracts

A Christian man was passing out Gospel tracts. Among those who received one was a gentleman who remarked as he received it that he feared such efforts did little permanent good. "I am not opposed to such work," he said. "In my younger days I did a good deal of it myself, but I cannot say that I ever saw any fruit from it." The tract distributor was somewhat discouraged by that remark, especially coming from one who evidently was a Christian of many years' standing. But he instantly remembered that his own conversion was brought about by means of...

Early in 1819, while waiting to see a patient, a young physician in New York took up and read a tract on missions, which lay in the room where he sat. On reaching home he spoke to his wife of the question that had arisen in his mind. As a result, they set out as foreign missionaries for Ceylon, and later, India. For thirty years the wife, and for thirty-six years the husband labored among the people there, and then went to receive their reward. Apart from what they did directly as missionaries, they left behind them seven sons and...

"In the morning sow thy seed, and in the evening withhold not thine hand: for thou knowest not whether shall prosper, either this or that, or whether they both shall be alike good" (Ecclesiastes 11:6). The circulation of tracts as a means of preaching the Gospel is actually older than the art of printing. Wycliffe, the reformer, was a great writer and distributor of tracts, employing his pupils and friends to multiply copies by hand. Martin Luther was a worker through tracts as well, but with the help, however, of the printing press, which came to his aid. Two hundred...

There was a certain brother in Christ a century ago whose business took him through the villages and towns of Minnesota, giving him many opportunities to sow the seed of the Gospel. One Saturday evening, having entered a town and making preparations for staying over the Lord's day, he was asked by a friend to come to his barn and look at his horse. Upon entering the barn, an open oat sack met his eye, and he quietly dropped a tract into it. This tract was put into the sack in the hope that this friend, whom he knew to...

A shoemaker received a tract from a customer one day, and did not care to read it so he used it as part of the lining of a shoe he was making. The shoe with the hidden message was purchased, and used for a long time until it was well-worn and in need of repair. It was taken to another shoemaker, who removed the worn-out sole and discovered the hidden messenger. He was immediately struck by the title, and read the whole message. It was the Word of God delivered to him in a most unusual way, and it awakened...