A Ripple of Hope

I preach the 2nd and 4th Sundays at our church. Today is my Sunday and the Title of the Message is "A Ripple of Hope". The theme comes from the famous RFK Quote:

"Few will have the greatness to bend history itself; but each of us can work to change a small portion of events, and in the total of all those acts will be written the history of this generation... It is from numberless diverse acts of courage and belief that human history is thus shaped. Each time a man stands up for an ideal, or acts to improve the lot of others, or strikes out against injustice, he sends forth a tiny ripple of hope, and crossing each other from a million different centers of energy and daring, those ripples build a current which can sweep down the mightiest walls of oppression and resistance."

The service turned out to be great. In addition to my giving the Word, the Gideons were there. The Gideon Society is the ministry that leaves Bibles in hotels all over the world as well as to people who simply ask. It was a divine appointment indeed, because while the time I deferred to the Gideon speak cut into my sermon, it was a great blessing because it laid the foundation for the major theme of my sermon, that each of us going our little part helps give people hope. For the Gideons, they express that with Bibles, and for each and every one of us, we have the same opportunity to give hope to the people God brings into our lives, by simply sharing of ourselves.

I was able to illustrate this point on a personal level because one of my most treasured friends, Jemal, drove out from Torrance to hear me speak. Now Jemal is the person who introduced me to my wife. It was his determined nudging to get me out of my self-made shell after my divorce many moons ago. And from that nudging, I ended up falling in love with and marrying the beloved wife, and that gave me hope that despite a difficult divorce, I could yet be reborn and have a part in God's plan for the future...what a ripple of hope!

Thanks bro for your looking out for a friend and being instrumental in God's plan for my personal redemption and eventual embracement of the ministry that God always had planned for me...