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Apples of Gold
Radio Script for September 16, 2009
“Don’t Give Up On Them!”
Hello, I’m Doug Apple…with Apples of Gold.
“He was just a stubborn old you-know-what.”
That’s what Allison said about her father-in-law, Arnold Dean.
And when it came to church his attitude was, “Just do your own thing and leave me out of it.”
His wife begged him, and he actually did come when she was baptized, but going to church was something he had no interest in.
Now let me ask you, do you have a loved one like this? They’re just not interested in God or church or religion – and they certainly don’t want to hear anything about Jesus or sin or forgiveness.
Well here is the message for you today. Don’t give up on them!
Now back to crusty old Arnold Dean. I said “old,” but really he was only 51, and he wasn’t all that crusty. His heart was just hard to the things of God.
Then he got cancer. And that changed everything, right?
Well, no. It didn’t.
Even after the radiation, even after losing his hair, they still had to basically beg him just to go to church on Easter Sunday.
So there he was, reluctant, but there. Allison decided that she just had to get her father-in-law down to the altar.
So she grabbed him and said, “Come up front with me.”
“No, no, no, no,” he said.
“Please just come up there,” she said. She was crying.
“Allison, this is more for you than for me.”
“Then do it for me.”
“So I drug him up there,” she said, “and he was just grumbling. I asked the pastor, ‘Will you just pray for him?’”
And guess what happened to Mr. Arnold Dean there at the altar that beautiful Easter Sunday?
Well, apparently nothing.
“I’m gonna kill you,” he told Allison afterwards.
“He was embarrassed and irritated,” she said.
Have you ever done that with a loved one? You thought it was just the right moment. “This is the day! This is the time, I just know it!” And then…nothing. They just get more irritated with you than ever.
Maybe you’re in that spot right now, that “nothing zone” where you have tried and failed and you almost feel like washing your hands of them. “It’s between them and God now,” you say to yourself. “I’ve done all I can do.”
Well here is the message for you today. Don’t give up on them!
June rolled around and Arnold’s health was getting worse. He was in the hospital and not doing well.
One Monday Allison and a friend went to visit. Her mother-in-law Barbara was there, and also there to visit were the pastor and the pastor’s brother.
At some point, as pastors always do when making hospital visits, Pastor Brian said to Arnold, “Well, can we pray for you?”
So they all stood around his bed and held hands. It was nothing special, Allison said, just normal praying.
“All of a sudden,” she said, “we heard this childlike voice. I had to look around to see who it was.”
It was Mr. Arnold Dean – crying out to God.
“Jesus, Jesus. I’m sorry. I’ve ran from you my whole life. I can’t do this anymore. I can’t do this alone. Please, the rest is yours. If you’ll just forgive me for what I’ve done until now, you can have what’s left of it.”
He continued blurting out to God in broken sentences, repenting in that humble, childlike voice.
“It was thick in that room,” Allison said. “I have never been in a room like that. The Spirit was strong. It was a glorious and intense moment. I can’t even explain it.”
The pastor said, “I’ve been around this stuff since I was 15 years old, but I’ve never felt anything like that.”
And from that moment on, Allison said, Arnold Dean was a changed man.
“I thought he would just go through the motions,” she said, “but it was complete. He was surrendered.”
After that he prayed and he told others how he just wanted to love God.
That was on June 15th, 2009.
This past Thursday Mr. Dean passed away.
“I’m so grateful for his salvation,” Allison said, “and knowing where he’s at now.”
And what would Allison say to anyone who is struggling with an unsaved loved one?
“There’s hope!” she said. “If he can change, anybody can change.”
So if you have a lost loved one, and their heart seems hard toward the things of God, and it just seems like they will never come to the Lord, well here is the message for you today.
Don’t give up on them!
Comments?
E-mail me: dougapple@wave94.com.
May God bless you today! With Apples of Gold…I’m Doug Apple.
© 2009 The Arrow’s Tip
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(Proverbs 25:11 – “A word fitly spoken is like apples of gold in settings of silver.”)
Why “The Arrow’s Tip”? Each morning, after diligently seeking the Lord, I write Apples of Gold. Then before I release it to the public I pray one final prayer, “Lord, send forth your arrows.” I envision Apples of Gold as arrows, tips dipped in the river of the water of life that flows from the throne of God (Rev. 22:1), sailing toward the hearts and minds of men and women around the world.
Doug Apple
General Manager - Wave 94
Christian Radio for Tallahassee
PO Box 4105
Tallahassee, FL 32315
(850) 926-8000
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