Ep 18: The One That Almost Got Away

Speaker1: Well, good morning, my friends. I hope you're having a great day. I'm Daniel Dopp and this is for your Sunday Morning Drive short podcast designed to put you in a Colossians three two mindset and help prepare your mind for worship on those hectic Sunday mornings. We are brought to you in partnership with the Ministry League Network of Podcasts. Please be sure that you check out the other great podcasts that are a part of the network, both through their app and through ministry. League.com I hope you enjoy the episode this morning. It's a little bit different as it's more of a personal anecdote than most of our episodes, but I hope you still enjoy it. I hope it's still beneficial for you, and I appreciate you making us a part of your Sunday morning routine. Let's go ahead and get into it. This is episode 18, the one that almost got away. Let's go to church.

Speaker2: Are we there yet?

Speaker1: I was thinking about my alma mater recently and my experiences that I had while I attended there. I graduated from the University of Evansville, Gowases, and I spent a lot of late nights in the business school. One late night I was in my usual spot and I just happened to be reading my Bible and preparing for a youth class that I was teaching at the time, and I was so caught up in the task at hand that I didn't hear or notice that I had company. You see, a fellow student, a stranger to me, had sat down right across from me. He asked me if I was reading for a class and I told him no, it was just for my own personal study, and he nodded approvingly, and an awkward and expectant silence took up residence between the two of us. It felt like he was waiting for something, and a few more seconds passed, and he sighed and shook his head, and he leaned forward with a look of disappointment on his face, and he said, you are really going to let me go, weren't you? You were really going to let me get away? You were going to let me get away without sharing Christ with me. Ethie. Ouch. I'll be honest. I sat there a little stunned, a little angry, and a little ashamed with him for calling me out.

Speaker1: After all, who was he to question me? My desire to teach well, thankfully, that anger quickly turned to regret and sadness. Because you know he he was right. I was going to let him walk away without so much as an inquiry about his spiritual condition, without an invite to study and without a conversation about the gospel. God had seemingly answered a prayer that I had been praying for some time to provide me with someone to study with. And here he was, right in front of me on a platter, and I was just going to let him walk away. What an absolute waste. And I was sitting there studying the scriptures, and was about to passively deny this man the utmost charge of what Scripture tells me to do. I apologize to him. And I thanked him and we talked for maybe 15 to 20 minutes. We talked about the Bible, where he was at spiritually, and we opened up with each other about our beliefs. I did invite him to study a study that unfortunately never materialized. But I often think, what if I think about that encounter a lot? Because so many times we waste our time with idle chatter, and when the opportunity to spread the good news is right there in front of us, we miss the mark.

Speaker1: In Matthew chapter 12, verse 36, Jesus is talking about the Pharisees and what kind of fruit they bear when he gives this somewhat horrifying directive. But I tell you that every careless the the word here is literally useless. Every careless word that people speak, they shall give an account thereof in the day of judgment. For by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned. That's pretty scary stuff. We are responsible not just for those words that we say, but for the ones that we don't. If we're going to be talking, let us be talking to people about Jesus. Let it not be careless. Let it not be useless. And let's not be careless with our opportunities to share the gospel. Let each soul we encounter be precious to us, because they are surely precious to the master. Don't let them get away. Well, those are my thoughts for your Sunday morning drive. Now it's time to hear yours. Our discussion questions for this week are. What would your life look like today if someone had failed to use an opportunity to speak to you about the gospel? And how can we be better about identifying those opportunities and creating those opportunities.

In the future?