‘‘Not so Respectable!’’

A True Story of “Piggy’s Island.”
PIGGY’S ISLAND! The name seems suggestive enough; but the real Piggy’s Island was neither a wee islet washed by ocean waves, nor an isolated tract of beautiful country devoted to a particular class of four-footed animals. The real actual Piggy’s Island was just a very humdrum and unsavoury row of tumble-down houses abutting on a blank dead wall down Hackney way, in north-east London.
A difficult sort of place to deal with, one that cost the faithful city missionary appointed to that district a good many sighs and aching’s of heart! On this particular day, he wended his way from one tumbledown hovel to another, not meeting, perhaps, with so much actual unwillingness to listen to his message, as with what is even harder to deal with than opposition—deadly apathy and dull indifference.
At length, he entered a tiny dwelling, scarcely fit to bear the sacred name of home—the room on the downstairs floor forming a sort of workshop for the man—a cabinetmaker by trade—while the one solitary apartment above served as bed and sitting-room combined for the whole family, numbering six!
Mrs. Clare, the mistress of this miserable home, was one of the most hopeless cases with which the missionary had to deal. He visited her regularly, spoke to her concerning Christ and her soul’s salvation; but she listened with that deadly indifferent listening he knew so well, as if the matter had no interest for her.  It was something for the respectable and refined, the folks who lived in comfortable homes, and had not had all heart and hope crushed out of them, as hers had been long ago.
She was too indifferent now to care or heed. She let him say what he liked, but the words seemed to fall meaningless on her ears, conveying no more to her than the pattering of the raindrops on the roof.
Almost in despair, the missionary tried to lead her thoughts to that soul of hers which must live for all eternity, while she as yet had never troubled or cared to make sure that she possessed one.
It seemed impossible to make her understand that it was a matter of supreme importance; she could not grasp it, so the missionary thought. She always declared she was too bad to be saved—
Too Low Down For God To Notice.
She had sunk beneath the surface of respectability, and the folks above her took no notice of her. Why should she dare to hope that God would care—the God who was worshipped by refined people in their Sunday best, in cushioned seats, amid arched pillars, coloured windows, and soft music of the churches and chapels round about? These things were not for her. She was not refined and respectable, and so, thinking God cared not, she herself like thousands of others, had ceased to care.
Little guessing what was passing in her mind, the missionary finished his appeal to her by saying, almost in despair, "Oh, Mrs. Clare, the Lord is willing to save you. He is no respecter of persons; if you would only give yourself to Him and ask Him to save you and cleanse you in the precious blood He shed for you, He will, for He has promised." The missionary saw no response to his appeal, and with a sigh, turned away to meet, maybe, with the same apathy and indifference elsewhere. But he was only human, he could not read the heart, he did not know.
Time passed; the rest of his district was covered, and the day came again for his regular visit to Piggy’s Island, and Mrs. Clare.
When she opened the door of the miserable one room where she lived, the change in her face almost startled him; dull apathy and indifference were gone: instead, the light of a new joy shone brightly on her face.
“Oh, sir,” she said, ‘‘I have been longing to see you again. Do tell me, what is that text—where is it—that one you told me last time you came?’’ The good man looked sorely puzzled. He generally repeated not only one verse from God’s Word, but many during his visits; he had quoted several to Mrs. Clare, and paid scores of calls since that conversation—how was he to remember?
“Which text was it? What was it about?”
“Oh, that one—bless the Lord for it, sir—where it says He is “not so respectable!”
“Not so respectable!” Suddenly the light of a new understanding dawned in the missionary’s face, and he repeated slowly:—
“God is no respecter of persons; is that it?”
“Yes, that’s it; thank God it showed me He was not too respectable to listen to me. I couldn’t forget it; after you were gone, those words came back again and again. You told me He would receive even the likes O’ me if I came to Him and asked Him to forgive me. So at last—
I Asked Him and He Did!”
There was no doubt about it, the light of joy on the woman’s face told the change. To her, poor, dark, down-trodden woman in Piggy’s Island, Jesus and His salvation had seemed so very, very far away—high up, above her, out of reach. But the glorious revelation of His willingness to save had come at last. That verse, with its strange application all her own, had broken the barrier down at last.
She had sunk beneath the surface of respectability in the world’s sight. Oh, the pity of it! But now she had seen it was not respectability, the Saviour wanted simply a heart yielded, because she realized her need of Him! To have struggled to raise herself to a higher level would have been to struggle in vain. Thank God it was not respectability she needed, but Christ, and oh, joy! He was no respecter of persons, “not so respectable” that He would turn her away! So, just as she was, she came and found His promise true, Jesus was willing to save even her from all her sins.
Weeks passed; the reality of Mrs. Clare’s conversion was proved beyond a doubt. Then, when summer came, the tired-out city missionary went to the sunny south coast for a brief rest from his toil amid the slums; and while he was away, the summons to a long eternal holiday—an endless holiday indeed—came to the poor woman in East London.  She was called from the grim poverty of Piggy’s Island to the boundless joy of Heaven!
“Not so respectable!” aye, the folks on earth had seemed far, far above her, but the Lord Jesus had stepped down and saved her sinful soul, and taken Mrs. Clare, a trophy of salvation, even from Piggy’s Island to the Land of Light.
Many a day has passed since then. The County Council has swept away the wretched hovels and built model dwellings near at hand instead, and the spot where Mrs. Clare dwelt is now a recreation-ground. Piggy’s Island is no more; but the down-trodden and the sunken in sin are with us still, lost to respectability, maybe, but not yet lost to God—to Him who lives and loves and saves, ‘‘not so respectable” that a single sinner who cries to Him for mercy is ever forgotten or passed by!
Grace Pettman.
“The Christian” June 26, 1902.