Have you ever wanted to change the world for the better, but have no idea how to go about it, because you are just an average “unknown” person in this big wide world?

Let me share an account about an unknown person who did change the world back in 1855 by doing one little thing, and that was sharing the gospel message with a teenage shoe salesman in Boston. You may or may not have heard about this story before, but it is worth repeating.

The result of that one solitary action by a previously unknown Sunday school teacher is still having a yet unbroken chain ‘ripple affect’ of evangelism right up to the present day in 2017.

There aren’t many people who could tell you the historical significance of a man named Edward Kimball (1823-1901). After all, he is so unknown that he doesn’t even have his own Wikipedia page. But through his simple service to God, he has had a worldwide impact.

In 1855, Kimball was a 31 year-old lay Sunday school teacher, who one day went to visit an 18 year-old boy who had visited his Sunday school class, but obviously had little interest in God or religion.

But during a visit with this young man at his job in a shoe store, Kimball led the boy to an eventual saving relationship with Jesus Christ. The young man in the shoe store was Dwight L. Moody.

Kimball “felt constrained to call on Dwight Moody and inquire about the condition of his soul.”

Kimball felt the Lord leading him, yet he feared the encounter and was so absorbed with debating whether or not he should actually go talk to Moody that he walked right past the store and had to circle back.

Mustering up the courage he decided to “have it over at once” and talk to Moody. While Moody was shelving shoes Kimball remembered “I went up to him and put my hand on his shoulder, and as I leaned over…I made my plea, and I feel that it was really a weak one.  I don’t know just what the words were I used…I simply told him of Christ’s love for him and the love Christ wanted in return.”

Moody described later how Kimball’s love was used to lead him to Christ:

I recollect that my teacher came around behind the counter of the shop I was at work in, and put his hand upon my shoulder, and talked to me about Christ and my soul.  I had not felt that I had a soul until then.  I said to myself: ‘this is a very strange thing.  Here is a man, who never saw me till lately, and he is weeping over my sins, and I never shed a tear for them.’  But I understand it now, and know what it is to have a passion for men’s souls and weep over their sins. I don’t remember what he said, but I can feel the power of that man’s hand on my shoulder. It was not long after that I was brought into the Kingdom of God on April 21, 1855.

Dwight Moody (1837-1899) went on to become one of the greatest evangelists in the world, sharing the gospel with over 100 million people, as well as founding the Moody Bible Institute and the Moody Church in Chicago.

But the story doesn’t end there. Through his ministry, Moody was responsible for a famous Baptist evangelist in London, England, named Frederick Brotherton Meyer (1847-1929), coming to the Christian faith in 1872. The two men remained lifelong friends.

Meyer in turn was responsible for the popular New York Presbyterian evangelist, John Wilbur Chapman (1859-1918) accepting Christianity in 1876.

Chapman influenced Billy Sunday (1862-1935), another prominent evangelist of the 20th century.  Sunday had been a professional baseball player. In 1886 he met his future wife, a Christian girl, and he soon became a Christian. In 1893 he became an assistant to J. Wilbur Chapman and soon learned how to be an effective Presbyterian evangelist beginning in 1896.

Billy Sunday in turn was integral in a man’s life named Mordecai Ham (1877-1961) coming to faith. Ham became a longtime notable Baptist evangelist in 1901 and he was the preacher responsible for leading a young man named Billy Graham to Christ in 1934 at a Charlotte, North Carolina revival meeting.

Billy Graham, born in 1918, has preached the gospel in person more people than anyone else in the history of Christianity through his crusades.  It is also estimated that Graham has reached well over 2 billion people worldwide with the gospel via radio and television broadcasts.

Billy’s son, Franklin Graham, born in 1952, became a Christian in 1974, and is now the president and CEO of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association.

And so the evangelism began in a simple gospel message given to Dwight L. Moody by an unknown Sunday school teacher in 1855 continues on to this very day 162 years later.

If you want to change the world for the better, sharing the gospel of Jesus Christ with another person is a good way to begin. We just never know how God may use us to influence others in coming to the saving grace found in Jesus Christ and spreading the Christian faith around the world to future generations of people.

 

There is a liberal amount of bitterness in the United States these days, especially since the election of Donald J. Trump as our president. Why? It’s due in great part because liberal Democrats in the world of American politics suffer from the same spiritual condition as the rest of humanity in that we are all born with an original sin nature.

One way a sin nature manifests itself is through bitterness. Today’s liberals are extremely poor losers and therefore have become a very bitter group. This group includes liberal politicians, liberal mainstream media news people, and liberalism supporters in general.

It’s really not surprising that radical liberals are bitter people. Unlike the Christian population of America, secular liberals have in large numbers rejected a faith in God and also in the liberating forgiveness of sins found through a belief in God’s living Son, Jesus Christ, as the “one and only” Savior from all of our sins.

Liberals are seemingly only happy when they are in a position of governing control over masses of people; thereby making it possible to force their radical liberal ideas and ways upon others—even though their leftist extremism is most often embraced by only a small percentage of our society.

But their viewpoints are presented in such a way (with the help of the liberal mainstream media), to make it appear as though they are speaking for a majority of American citizens. As we all should know by now, deception is another favorite tactic radical liberals love to employ in order to achieve control over the American populace, as many as they can indoctrinate with their often twisted propaganda.

When in control, liberals are a very prideful, self-centered, arrogant, boastful, pompous, and overall egotistical bunch. When not in control liberals cannot accept their rejection as being at all possible; so their bitterness evolve into other sinful behaviors, exhibited in such undesirable and ugly ways as wrath, anger, clamor, vilification and malice toward any person or group opposing them.

The Bible speaks about bitterness, wrath, anger, clamor, vilification, and malice:

“Get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger, outcry and slander, along with every form of malice. Be kind and tender-hearted to one another, forgiving each other just as in Christ, God forgave you.” (Ephesians 4:31-32)

“Do not let the sun set upon your anger, and do not give the devil a foothold.”
(Ephesians 4:26-27)

This is great advice for all of us to heed, but it seems radical liberals do not believe in the old adage of “Don’t let the sun go down on your anger.” This is not just any old adage, but is actually Scriptural biblical instruction for us to follow and which we should apply to our lives in order to make our lives better.

Let us review some of the biblical proverbs from chapters 10 through 15 of Proverbs that warn of the “folly and foolishness” of certain human behaviors and ways of thinking; all of which the Lord views as sinful wickedness.

The following are just some of the proverbial examples of behavior and thinking we would be wise to avoid. It’s obvious these proverbs still speak perfectly to us today. The proverbs are listed in order as found in Proverbs chapters 10-15:

“The mouth of the wicked conceals violence.”

“He who perverts his ways will be found out.”

“Hatred stirs up strife.”

“With the mouth of the foolish, ruin is at hand.”

“He who forsakes reproof goes astray.”

“He who conceals hatred has lying lips.”

“He who spreads slander is a fool.”

“Doing wickedness is like sport to a fool.”

“What the wicked fears will come upon him.”

“The expectation of the wicked perishes.”

“The mouth of the wicked brings forth what is perverted.”

“When pride comes, then follows dishonor.”

“The wicked will fall by their wickedness.”

“The treacherous will be caught by their greed.”

“With his mouth the godless man destroys his neighbor.”

“By the mouth of the wicked a city is torn down.”

“He who despises his neighbor lacks sense.”

“He who goes about as a talebearer reveals secrets.”

“Where there is no guidance, the people fall.”

“The perverse in heart are an abomination to the Lord.”

“The expectation of the wicked is wrath.”

“He who hates reproof is stupid.”

“The counsels of the wicked are deceitful.”

“The compassion of the wicked is cruel.”

“He who pursues vain things lacks sense.”

“An evil man is ensnared by the transgression of his lips.”

“The way of a fool is right in his own eyes.”

“Deceit is in the heart of those who devise evil.”

“Lying lips are an abomination to the Lord.”

“The heart of fools proclaims folly.”

“The way of the wicked leads them astray.”

“A scoffer does not listen to rebuke.”

“A wicked man acts disgustingly and shamefully.”

“Wickedness subverts the sinner.”

“Through presumption comes nothing but strife.”

“He who is crooked in his ways despises the Lord.”

“A false witness speaks lies.”

“A scoffer seeks wisdom, and finds none.”

“Leave the presence of a fool.”

“The folly of fools is deceit.”

“Fools mock at sin.”

“The heart knows its own bitterness.”

“There is a way which seems right to a man, but its end is the way of death.”

“The naïve believes everything.”

“A fool is arrogant and careless.”

“A quick-tempered man acts foolishly.”

“In all labor there is profit, but mere talk leads only to poverty.”

“The folly of fools is foolishness.”

“He who is quick-tempered exalts folly.”

“Passion is rottenness to the bones.”

“Sin is a disgrace to any people.”

“A harsh word stirs up anger.”

“The mouth of fools spouts folly.”

“A fool rejects his father’s discipline.”

“A foolish man despises his mother.”

“Folly is joy to him who lacks sense.”

“The Lord will tear down the house of the proud.”

“He who neglects discipline despises himself”

When reading through this list of proverbs, think about the bitterness found in the public speaking and behavior of liberals in mainstream media and the Congress ever since the election of President Donald J. Trump.

Remember, the proverbs listed above are found in the Word of God and there is nothing in the Bible that God did not want in the Bible.

It’s up to each of us as individuals to accept or reject God’s Word and godly wisdom.

Don’t you think it is time to put away bitterness and get out the Word of God?

Your decision not only affects the future of our American society, but also has everlasting and eternal consequences for you.

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