How One Gospel Conversation Can Change it All
I have a story I recently came across that I hope will encourage you personally and practically today. It’s from a biography of Adoniram Judson entitled, “Bless God and Take Courage,” that I was reading recently.
If you’ve never read “To the Golden Shore” about this man and his family and how they spread the gospel as the first modern missionaries to Myanmar, I cannot recommend it highly enough. But this was another biography, and it contained a story I had never heard.
Ann Judson, Adoniram’s first wife, was doing everything she could to support her husband when he had been thrown into a deadly prison. Ann met a kind Burmese woman who would bring rice and eggs to her, and Ann shared the gospel with her during one of their interactions. But then this woman and her husband had to flee that region suddenly, and she never saw her again. Eventually Adoniram was released from prison, and Ann died.
Decades later, another missionary named Murilla Ingalls had been inspired by the Judsons to move to Myanmar and was sharing the gospel in a Burmese village. As Murilla was sharing, a Burmese man approached her and asked if she would come to his village to share about Jesus there. Murilla agreed to do so, and one day she traveled with this man to his village.
A crowd gathered around to listen to her, and as she shared the gospel, she heard the voice of an elderly woman in the back of the crowd cry out, “That’s the rest of it! That’s the rest of it!”
Murilla stopped speaking and asked the woman, “What do you mean?”
The older woman came walking up to the front and explained with excitement, “Long, long ago, when I was young, I was living in a place where I met a woman who was caring for her husband in prison. One day she talked to me about her God and how He had provided a way of salvation from our sins. But soon thereafter, we had to move, and I could not remember exactly how we can be saved from our sins. And now you are here sharing that part of the story!”
This elderly woman said, “I want to trust in Jesus.” Moreover, the man who had invited Murilla to come to his village just so happened to be this elderly woman’s son. He also trusted in Jesus that day. And now a church began in the village of a woman whom Ann Judson had shared the gospel with for the first time decades before.
I share this story as an encouragement to you. Don’t ever underestimate what God will do when you share the gospel with someone else. You may see the fruit of that conversation in that moment or in the days ahead, which would be awesome. But even if you don’t ever see the fruit of that conversation in this world, trust that God is still writing awesome stories that you might not be able to celebrate until eternity.
In light of this, simply put, let’s share the gospel with someone today. And let’s trust that God will work in ways far beyond what we may ever see in this world.
This article first appeared in The Commission—Radical’s biweekly newsletter with gospel stories from around the world and exclusive encouragement from David Platt to help you follow Jesus and make him known. Subscribe now.
