31/12/2021
NOT EVERYONE KNOWS THAT...
The night the Titanic sank on April 14, 1912... 1,528 people walked into freezing waters.
At the time of the Titanic disaster, John Harper (Pastor Evangelico) was 39 years old, widow with a six year old daughter, Annie Jessie. He was on his way to Chicago with his daughter and sister Jessie W. Leitch to go preach at Moody Church for several weeks, where he was guest minister the previous fall. When the ship was hit by an iceberg on the night of April 14, 1912, her daughter and sister came on board a lifeboat, but Harper stayed on board and then threw into the water once the ship started sinking. Some survivors recount that Harper preached the message of the Gospel to the end (Preaching Acts 16:31), first aboard the sinking ship and then among those who were in the freezing water, in which he himself then died:
Pastor Harper preached to a young man who had climbed on a piece of debris and asked him in between one breath and another: "Are you saved? ", the young man replied that he wasn't.
John Harper then took off his life jacket, threw it on the man and said "Here then, you need this more than me... " and I swam away to other people.
A few minutes later the Pastor went back to swimming towards the young man and managed to lead him to salvation.
Of the 1,528 people who went into the water that night, six were saved by lifeboats. One of these was this young man on the debris.
Four years later, during a reunion of survivors, this young man stood up and in tears recounted how John Harper led him to Christ.
Pastor Harper had tried to swim to help other people, but due to the extreme cold, he had become too weak to swim. His last words before going into freezing waters were "Believe in the name of the Lord Jesus and you will be saved".
This servant of God did what he had to do. 🙏🙏🙏
