911

What do you do when help doesn’t come?

Sharon Edge found out.

Her boyfriend, Curtis, suffered severe abdominal pain and needed to go to the hospital. She called 911 and was told help was on the way.

Nothing happened.

She kept calling. After the fourth call, help still had not come. The operator told her that it was because the snow in Pittsburgh had shut down the highways. Three times, the paramedics were within 1000 feet of her house but got blocked. They would not walk through the snow to rescue her boyfriend.

Thirty hours passed, and Sharon made a tenth and final call to 911. It was only to report that Curtis had died.

People need help but don’t know where to find it. In physical emergencies, we call 911. But what about spiritual ones?

In Acts 16, a jailer faced his mortality as he envisioned prisoners escaping through earthquake-shattered doors. Paul stopped him, and he asked a simple question: What must I do to be saved? This Gentile had no theological conception of that word. He knew that in his life he was lost and needed help to find the way.

And Paul showed him.

How many people will you meet who need some help? Could they find it from you?