As I got to my bus stop this morning, I saw John, a fellow I'd met a short while back. I'd been thinking lately about evangelizing those whose paths I intersect, but because John is mentally diabled, I'd avoided this with him for unsubstantial reasons.
But this morning, God governed my reason, and I asked myself, 'Does God love this man any less than the other prospects for evangelism I find more attractive?'
I remembered that I suffer a lack of boldness for which I've been praying.
Here's a chance, I finally thought, to train myself in evangelism with one who would certainly not respond in a way that might discourage me.
And even after arriving at the inescapable conviction that I was to reach out to John for Christ's sake, I yet resisted it a bit, commenting, in my first attempt at conversation, on the weather.
But then I asked him what he had planned for today at the program he attends.
He said bocce, and then I remembered that he likes bowling, so I asked him which is harder.
Then, after confirming the program is Monday through Friday, I asked him what he does on the weekends.
Watch TV. Sports.
Do you go to church?
No, I want to! he said with more enthusiasm than I'd heard from him up till now.
I invited him to our church, took down his number and address, and we boarded the bus.
As I returned to my audiobook 'Basic Economics' (a pitiful alternative to proclaiming the message of God's salvation), I felt satisfaction in my heart that I'd done the godly works for which I'd been set apart in Christ, rather than absorb myself in fleeting selfish pursuits of knowledge.
For in the economy of the church age, the purpose of the believer is to facilitate a personal culture of humble deference to God's power and purpose.
And so I returned to the words of Thomas Sowell, this time as if endowed with divine implications:
"... because scarce resources have not been allocated to their most valued uses."
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