For the next several weeks, I will be utilizing the chapters of a book called Give Life that was published by Youth For Christ USA several years ago. It chronicles a bit of our journey in this incredible and wonderful 72-year-old mission…
It was an honor to speak at the Kansas Prayer Breakfast.
The event has attracted prominent speakers over many decades, and I took seriously the opportunity to represent both Youth For Christ and my King.
The banquet hall at the Ramada Inn in Topeka, Kansas was full, and the appropriate VIPs were in attendance. In fact, Governor Sam Brownback sat right beside me at the speakers’ table.
I felt the weight of my unimpressive resume and the responsibility to represent our mission well.
God moved, and I sensed His Spirit shining light where it was needed most.
With the breakfast complete I was whisked away in celebrity-like fashion to my next appointment…
…but this was not a star-studded follow-up. No backstage pass was required.
Within minutes, I stood at the front of a classroom in the Kansas Juvenile Detention Center.
Twenty-five teenaged inmates were escorted into the room.
Rows of orange jumpsuits greeted me.
Tattoos littered the faces of these teenagers, but they listened with hungry eyes.
Thirty minutes later they shuffled out of the room – hands clasped behind their backs. Gone, but never forgotten.
One experience resides on my resume, but the other is deeply imbedded in my soul.
“I was in prison and you came to me.” Matthew 25:36b
Obedience escorts us to venues God ordains.
Sometimes that’s a seat next to a Governor, and sometimes that’s a front row seat to His grace.
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