I love to hear of your Divine appointments when you take the opportunity to share the Gospel with different individuals it makes my heart rejoice. If I can frame witnessing like Scripture as a Two edged sword and His word will not return onto Him void I have spoken to a number of individuals over the years and sadly they passed away shortly after I had shared with them their need of salvation.

There is one individual who stands out in this category his name was Ned, he had worked on my uncles farm for many years. I was driving down a country road to the local village on a dark rainy night when I saw this lone small figure who I recognised as Ned so I pulled over to give him lift to his home.

At first he refused to get in because he was soaking wet but I insisted, Ned was a very devout Roman Catholic and was normally very hard to strike up a spiritual conversation with him, but this night was very different as it was him who initiated the conversation. This then gave me the opportunity to tell him about my Saviour and how he could be saved too and that he didn’t need a priest a saint a confessional and all he needed was to put his faith in Christ.

This next bit is hard, Steven. As we arrived at his home he thanked me for the lift and for telling him of how to get saved, I handed him a gospel tract and made him promise he would read it the minute he got through his front door which was about 20 paces from where we had stopped I waited until he got into his home shut his door and switch his lights on. Then I pulled away in my car pleading with the Lord that he would save Ned. The next morning not long after we had opened the yard where I worked at the time, the news started to come in Ned had died last night, his brother had come home and had to push Ned’s body out of the way to get into their home as he dropped dead just behind the door so maybe 30-40 seconds after I had given him the gospel tract wished him good night he was in eternity.

So when I witness to someone I realise it is a serious business, it is an urgent business for time is short.

Here is a short poem I wrote about Ned

Ned is Dead

Did you hear the news they found Ned dead this last night
He was just behind door they said just home from work
Ned was dead and I wept for he was dead
You see I had just dropped him off at his home last night

It was raining that night a lonely figure he was, trudging in the rain
I stopped and said jump in Ned I'll take you home
He asked me about my Saviour so I told him about the Christ of God
The Saviour who came into the world to save sinners

As I dropped him off I gave him a leaflet telling him about the Christ of God
I said oh Ned will you read it when you get in and with a smile, he said yes
You see this is why I wept when I heard that Ned was dead
Oh how quickly you can go from life to death for it was just a few steps for Ned

December 2018