Gipsy Smith was preaching in Edinburgh, Scotland. One of his helpers was George Jackson. Mrs. Jackson came to him at the close of the gospel meeting, and said, “Gipsy, there is a young woman in the inquiry room who is in a desperate state. She refuses to go away. Nobody seems to be able to help her, and she keeps crying out that she must see you.”
Going with Mrs. Jackson, Gipsy found her at the far end of the room. The poor girl was lying full length on the floor. He said, “I never saw anyone in such abject misery in all my life. I knelt beside her and asked her what was the trouble.”
“Oh,” she said, “I have a great sin to confess.”
Smith replied, “You had better tell it not to me, but to Jesus.”
“Oh, sir, I want to confess an awful sin. I am a mother, and I fathered my child on an innocent man. He was a student in one of the theological colleges studying for the ministry, and I blighted his life as well as branding him. I took him through three courts and won my case, and I have a bit of hell inside. He was dismissed and disgraced, and he is as innocent as you are. What am I to do?”
This sounded like a notorious court case written about in the papers. The truth was out, “I am the woman in the case. I have sworn falsely against Mr–.” She gave the name of the brilliant M. A., an international golfer, who after fighting the case up to the highest court had been branded, disgraced and “dismissed from society.”
The poor girl kept crying, “How can I find peace? They will surely send me to jail. What am I to do?” “Do?” he said, “do right.” She said, “I have no peace.”
Thinking that she wanted assurance, but not conversion, Gipsy said, “And you never will have peace. In this world you may have pardon on condition, but there is no such thing as peace for you, for you will never forgive yourself that wrong.” He did not spare her. He was convinced that the only way for her to face her sin in the sight of God would be to resolve to confess publicly. Better to go to jail than to remain a hypocrite.
Gipsy told her, “You must take off that brand as publicly as you put it on–just as publicly.” “Oh, sir! He will send me to prison.” “If it means prison, and you go to prison, you will go with the consciousness that you made an honest attempt to undo the wrong.”
Under those words the poor thing collapsed. Gipsy’s heart ached, yet he did not dare apply a slight remedy to her wound, crying “peace” falsely. “When you are willing as far as lies in your power to undo the wrong, God will help you, and He will not forsake you.”
She bit her lip till it bled, and clasping the chair in front of her, said, “Oh, God, I will do it even if it means prison.”
That was not an easy path for that girl, but she took it courageously. She went to the proper authorities and told the truth, “Because I gave my heart to God, I had to take this course to clear my conscience of its guilt.” The whole proceedings were published in the London papers. She had the court revise the whole case, and before a crowded courtroom said, “I make this statement first of all because Jesus has saved me; and secondly, I must do justice to an innocent man.”
Three months afterwards, Gipsy was outside a shop in St. Paul’s Churchyard when a barrister friend from Scotland came up. “Are you Gipsy Smith?” he asked.
“Yes, sir.”
“Well,” he said, “I was in court when that girl made her confession. There was not a dry eye in the court at that time, and it did more to make men of my type believe in the gospel of Jesus Christ than all the sermons we have heard in a quarter of a century.”
Later, Gipsy was in Glasgow. At the close of a meeting, the door opened and a tall, striking young man entered. He turned the key in the lock. “He was a much bigger man than I,” said Smith, “and I pulled myself together and prepared for emergencies. Then he threw his arms around me. ‘Man!’ he cried, ‘I am the fellow in the case. You delivered me.'” The next night, his mother and father were in that room, and tears mingled as they retold the story. The girl found the right man, and became a happy wife. The brilliant student, who had been so ruthlessly wronged, was reinstated without a stain on his character. And best of all, God was glorified.