Hopeless Case?
Theme of the Week: Can You Relate?
John Sloan
Thursday, January 9, 2003
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Key Bible Verse: If you are kind only to your friends, how are you different from anyone else? Even pagans do that (Matthew 5:47). Bonus Reading:Matthew 5:43-48
Robert's marriage caved in about the same time he received a dishonorable discharge from the military. That kicked his drinking into high gear, and soon he was adding drugs to the mix. In the middle of one of his deepest troughs, he began calling me for help. I'd known Robert for almost five years. He'd helped us get settled after our last move. But I couldn't see jumping into his life and being dragged down with him.
But Robert's telephone calls started coming regularly—morning, afternoon, and evening—for about a year. Some members of both of our families were skeptical, feeling our phone exchanges were a waste of time.
I offered him as many encouraging thoughts as I could, remembering that I, too, had struggled with discouragement, depression, and lack of direction. Soon a radical change took place in our conversations. I began to hear and see Robert as an equal, and not as a person with hopeless problems, and to realize that his were the same problems that confront us all.
Today Robert is happily married. He has a loving family, he enjoys his career, and, best of all, he relies on God and not alcohol.
—John Sloan in The Barnabas Way
My Response: A hurting person for whom I could be a resource is …
Thought to Apply: My foul-weather friend.
—Winston Churchill (about newspaper publisher and political leader William Aitken)
Adapted from The Barnabas Way (WaterBrook, 2002) by permission.
Copyright © 2002 by the author or Christianity Today International/Men of Integrity magazine.
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