Dear friends in Christ,
During my recent travels, I had an inspiring conversation with a rideshare driver. He had a cross hanging from the rearview mirror, so I asked him to tell me about his church.
Then I asked him how he became a Christian, because we were in a country that had a low percentage of Christians. The driver told me about his childhood, which was challenging. While he was in school, he got involved in gangs. One time, he was badly injured in a gang fight, and he spent some time in the hospital. It wasn’t his first visit to the hospital about a gang fight.
He told me how one of his schoolteachers came to visit him. She’d been to see him several times on his visits to the hospital after fights. This time, she had a long conversation with him. Finally, she invited him to change his life: she urged him to spend his life doing something good in the world rather than fighting for gangs. She told him about Jesus, and how much God loves him.
The driver accepted her invitation. He joined a church and changed his whole life. He found a worthwhile career. And after he retired from that, he decided to drive for a rideshare company. He said he thinks God put him here to tell people the Gospel of Jesus Christ. He’s certainly good at it!
I thought about all this because too often, in our society we may be tempted to write some people off as hopeless. But in God’s eyes, there is always hope for everyone. No one is beyond redemption.
As our world gets more and more polarized, it can be easy to give up on some people, to begin to tell ourselves that some are beyond redemption. I’m inspired by this teacher’s faith and her willingness to take the time to get to know a “gang kid.” What if we get to know our neighbors so we can love them—and perhaps invite them to know the love of Jesus?
Yours faithfully,
Scott Gunn
Executive Director
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