I know that everyone’s been in this situation:
You’re walking with your parent at the local supermarket, and you see someone who looks strangely familiar… Out of the blue, your parent walks straight up to them and starts talking endlessly. After smiling politely through the conversation, you say goodbye to the person.
You then turn to your parent and ask them “Who was that?”
Your parent turns to you with a confused expression and says,”You don’t recognize her? That was your aunt!”
No matter how much you picture the person’s face, you can’t really place them before someone else tells you who they are. This has happened to me countless times. Only it was a bit different.
I try to be a Campus Missionary as much as I can, as I’m sure a lot of you are. But I get stumped sometimes with my stack of The Book of Hope on who to give them to. I want to help someone with it, and I want to give out as many as I can, but it’s terribly complicated figuring out who needs it. I wouldn’t want to walk up to someone with one in my hand and say “Hey, take this. I think you need it.” and have them tell me “Dude, I’m already a Christian. I go to church every Sunday and I have Jesus in my heart.” How would I walk away from that? I would feel so foolish. What would they think of me?
So, you see, it’s exactly like the “Forgotten Aunt” situation. You can’t really tell if someone’s Christian or not just from how they look, or even how they act. What it really comes down to is that you just have to talk to people to know who they are. Then you can be a Campus Missionary to them, or actually invite them to join the cause too. Building relationships with people is one of the greatest ways to help.
