ss and flowers were already growing thick and tall. He went
straight up to the end of the room, and there, standing on a form, as
if the place had been filled with one or two hundred eager listeners,
although no single human being was to be seen, he PREACHED, as he had
never yet preached in his life. The Love of God, the 'Love that will
not let us go,' seemed to him the most real thing in the whole world.
All his life he had longed to find an anchor for his soul. Now that he
had found it, he must help others to find it too. Why doesn't everyone
find it? Ah! there he began to speak of sin; how sin builds up a wall
between our hearts and God; how, in Jesus Christ, that wall has been
thrown down once for all, and now there is nothing to keep us apart
except our own blindness and pride; and how if we will only turn round
and open our hearts to Him, He is longing to come in and dwell with
us.

As Stephen went on, he pleaded yet more earnestly. He thought of the
absent woodcutters. He felt that he loved every single one of those
wild, rough men; and if he loved them, he, a stranger, how much more
dear must they be to their heavenly Father. 'Grant me to win each
single soul for Thee, O Lord,' he pleaded, 'each single soul for
Thee.'

Where were they all now, these men to whom he had come to speak? He
could not find them. But God could. God was their shepherd. Even if
His messenger failed, the Good Shepherd would seek on until He found
each single wandering soul that He loved. 'And when the shepherd
findeth the lost sheep, after leaving the ninety and nine in the
wilderness, how does he bring it home? Does he whip it? Does he
threaten it? No such thing! he carries it on his shoulder and deals
most tenderly with the poor, weary, wandering one.'

While he was speaking he thought of the absent woodcutters with an
evergrowing desire to help them. He thought of the hard lives they
were forced to lead, of the temptations they must meet with daily, and
of the lack of all outward help towards a better life. As he repeated
the words again, 'Grant me, O Lord, to win these lost sheep of Thine
back to Thee and to Thy service; help me to win each single soul for
Thee,' he felt as if, somehow, his voice, his prayer, must reach the
men he sought, even though hundreds of miles of desolate forest lay
between. Towards the end of his sermon, the tears ran down his cheeks.
At last, utterly exhausted by the strength of his desire he sat down
on