A New Beginning
Born to Serve – In the Beginning
By Wendy Roberts, BTS Focus Group Leader
March 10, 2010
I have been a Christian for over 40 years. Yes, I was a child when I accepted Jesus as my Lord and Savior and I remember it as vividly today as the day I received Him and was baptized. I wish I could say from that moment on, I have lived my life for the Lord, but that would be a false statment. I had brief times when I focused on a Bible study or taught different courses to other Christians. In terms of actually doing what Jesus told me to do, well, I must be honest and say that I’m guilty of mostly sitting on my hands instead of using them to tell a lost and dying world about Him.
That is, until recently. In the past few years, the Lord has been “setting me up” to evangelize. That means, He has put numerous opportunities before me to witness to people and sometimes I rose to the occasion to speak a word of encouragement, but again, I haven’t actually led a single soul to a saving knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ. I’ve gone around in circles chastising myself and feeling guilty because I know the Lord would want me to proclaim His Name. I will have no excuse on the Day when I stand before the Lord, just me and Him, and He asks me whether I did what He asked me to do. With that image seared into my brain, I began looking for ways to serve Him better.
Last October, my friend, Diane Hale, was teaching a course called “Born To Serve” at the church I attend. Since it was only a six week course, I thought it might be good to invest some time to learn what I should do next. It was obvious from the first class that the challenge we all face is seeing God’s assignments when He puts them in front of us. The class was asked to watch for those opportunities during the week and report back the following class time.
I didn’t realize how soon or what circumstance the Lord would put before me that would challenge everything I had learned in the seminar for three weeks.
My children had a Fall Break in October and we decided to drive to Savannah for the long weekend. We arrived safe and sound, put our bags in the hotel room and decided to go eat. After dinner, we drove to downtown Savannah, parked the car and began exploring the streets. As we rounded a corner, a nicely dressed young man approached us to see if we wanted us to be “extras” (no pay) in a movie being shot by the students of the local arts college. We thought it would be fun. And it was, until somebody decided to spoil it for us.
As a group of “extras” stood under the hot lights, two young men in their twenties joined the group. They reeked of alcohol and tobacco and acted accordingly. They also “happened” to be standing right behind me. Under normal circumstances, I would have said something, but I just started to pray that they would tire of us ignoring them and move on, which they eventually did.
A few minutes later, the hot lights were making me woozy, so I stepped out of the group and headed down the sidewalk for fresh air. The obnoxious young men had left, or so I thought. As I stood at a distance watching the movie shoot, one of the boys came up to me and loudly asked for a cigarette. He was well over six feet tall and had a “baby face”. Right then and there the Lord impressed upon me to speak to this young man. I told him politely that though I did not have any cigarettes, I did have something better and before he could reply, I said “I have Jesus.” He was shocked by my answer and even in his inebriated state asked me to explain why Jesus would be better than anything else the world could offer him. Wow. Was that a loaded question!
So, not thinking he’d remember a word I said, I simply told him that Jesus is the only One he can depend on and Jesus could take away his desire to smoke and drink. When I finished, he somberly looked me in the eye and said, “I know all about this Jesus. I grew up in the Mormon Church and all I ever got was a huge dose of nonsense religion and hypocrisy from people who called themselves “Christian”. So, you aren’t telling me anything I don’t already know about. Besides that, I’ve left home and I’m playing in a rockin’ hip hop band and having the time of my life, so why would I want to drop all that for Jesus? No disrespect intended, ma’me, but you can keep your Jesus.”
He went on tell me how he hated organized religion and how he didn’t think the church was doing what Jesus told it to do. He articulated his views very well, and by his speech I gathered that he was well educated. Surprisingly, I agreed with him on every point because he had been so hurt by the church and frankly, so had I. When the conversation came to a close, I told him I would pray for him and that I would ask the Lord to help him get back to Jesus sooner than later because the time is so short. The young man told me he’d pray for me, too. It seemed that he had actually sobered up a little by the time we were through.
I may never know this side of Heaven what ever became of that young Mormon boy, but God knows, and all I can do is pray for him. God is always faithful. The Lord promises us that His Word will never return void and I must believe that something on the spiritual level occurred when God set up that divine appointment with that boy. Perhaps he will remember the night a crazy old lady spoke Truth into his life and he’ll look to Jesus.
O, Lord, let it be so!
