Lamentations 1:12

An incredible story was reported by Italian newspaper reported this week. Reports say two girls were swimming at the beach near Naples when they got caught up in fierce waves. These young girls screamed for help for sometime and no onlookers ever came to their rescue. By the time lifeguards arrived on the scene, it was too late for these two young ones. They died at age twelve and thirteen.

The horror does not end there. As the bodies of these two young girls lay dead on the beach, photos show people continued to sunbath just meters away from where their dead bodies laid only partial covered. These photos from the scene show absolutely no concern on the faces of sunbathers for the loss of life that just occurred.

While reading this story, I was reminded of the absolute indifference many Italians have to human life and concern for their souls. With death just meters away, they were unmoved by this tragic loss of life.

As much as this probably disgusts us (and should) I wonder if we are all not guilty of the same thing. I wonder how many times people scream to us for help, but those cries go largely ignored. More importantly, lives are perishing all around us while we soak up the sun this summer.

Romans 10:13

Sometimes it is good to be reminded of things we should already know...

The other day I was with a friend trying to witness to people. The first person we went up to was a nice old lady sitting on a bench. We thought surely this lady will hear us out. Think again – this lady could not possibly have been less interested in the gospel message! After a just a few minutes she asked us to depart.

Just then, as we were turning and walking away, a young man with a terrible look on his face was walking by. We asked him if we could talk with him for a few minutes. He stopped but looked rather mad we were bothering him.

After some initial conversation – I asked him if he considered himself to be a good person. He said, "No." I asked him if he had ever lied before and he said he was a liar. I asked him if he ever stole before and he said he was a thief. He was broken without any prodding. After establishing that he was not a good person, He said – “I have been thinking about this the whole day. My life is a mess, I need to be forgiven man, but I don’t know what to do!”

I then shared the glorious gospel with Damien and believe with all my heart he got saved...

Great reminders...

• Never judge by someone’s outward appearance whether or not they are interested in the gospel message.
• The Lord is in complete control - had the lady waited 10 more seconds to tell us to get lost, we would have missed our opportunity to talk with Damien!
• Not everyone is a willing rejector of the gospel message - some just have not been given the opportunity to receive the gift of Christ.
  
• God is at work in people’s lives – and wants to use us in His plan.