I'm ready to go home

"I have cancer", that's what the gentlemen across from me said while waiting for his ride home from the hospital.  There was a big trashbag full of medication on the table next to him.  He was a small man, perhaps he had been losing weight from the treatments.  Or maybe he had always been small.  Either way, he was friendly and somewhat optimistic about his situation.  We sat there for what seemed like hours.  Every few moments a few words were exchanged.  "I'm ready to go home" he said.  Those words rang out like a thousand gun shots.

The only thing I could think was, "Is he really ready to go home?".  Of course I knew what he meant by "home", but all I could think about was the state of his soul.  The longer we sat there the more uncomfortable I felt.  I could feel the lump in my throat growing as if I had swallowed a golf ball.  How long would I sit there and not ask the most important question in life?  Would I really let this opportunity for sharing God's love slip through my fingers?

I began to think about all the other times I allowed my fear to hold me captive.  Opportunity after opportunity to share the gift of life.  By this time, my mind was flooded by past failures and I could see that my window of opportunity was coming to a close.  Perhaps you can relate.  Maybe you know exactly what I'm talking about.  On the outside I was as cool as a cucumber, but my insides were in knots.  I knew what I had to do.  Now was the moment of truth.  I could no longer allow my own comfort or lack there of to determine my actions.

About that time, they called for us.  It was time for Evie's ultrasound.  We gathered our things and began to move.  I had failed.  Feeling sorry for myself I went over to him, extended my hand and asked his name.  "Charles", he said.  I'm Brian and I'll be praying for you.  Those words came out of my mouth but that's not what I was thinking.  "I'm Brian and I'm just trying to make myself feel better by being cliche." 

I'd like to say that I knelt down beside him right there in the lobby being led by the Holy Spirit and called heaven into that room on his behalf...but I didn't.  I'd like to say that I was obedient to the small voice of the Lord urging me to witness to him...but I can't.  What I can say to you is this.  God taught me a very valuble lesson that day, one I thought I already understood. 

I'm responsible.  And you are responsible.  As believers and the redeemed of the Lord, we are responsible to share the gift that God has freely given and desires to give.  I fear that most of us in the American church have become spiritual hoarders.  We take and take and take, piling up our spiritual mess all around us until we can no longer see the lost and hurting.  We justify our hoarding telling ourselves that, "someday I'll use that".

Paul tells us in 2 Corinthians 4:7 that , "We have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellence of the power may be of God and not of us."   Although we are weak and fragile, we carry inside of us the knowledge of God in the face of Christ.

Listen to his words later in chapter 5:20, "Now then, we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were pleading through us: we implore you on Christ's behalf, be reconciled to God."  Lord, help me.  I ought to be like this.  I should be pleading with those around me, "BE RECONCILED TO GOD!"  It is my prayer for you and I that we take hold of this great truth, be clothed in boldness and be ambassadors for Christ sake before the sands of time run out. 

"Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit."  Matthew 28:19