When it comes to inviting people [to hear the gospel], never say no for anyone. Never say no on anyone's behalf. Jesus didn't give up on the people everyone else gave up on. You just never know.

I remember a banquet in a secular setting. A group of us were sitting at a table, and there was one empty seat. This guy sat down in it. He was a smooth character. I sat on one side of him, and a very attractive woman sat on the other side of him. When he sat down, his first comment was to the woman: "Well, what have you been doing here except turning the heads of everybody in the room?"

I said, "Well, just eating lunch."

That launched us into an interesting conversation. The discussion turned toward spiritual things, and at one point I talked about being at a church for people who don't like church. He said, "That's interesting," and told me about his background. He grew up Jewish and had no involvement in that faith beyond age 12. He had been to a Unitarian church a couple of times and had been divorced three times.

If I had to assess someone on the basis of one conversation who was as far away from faith in Christ as could be, it would have been this guy. His name was Steve. I invited him to come to our church, and I never thought I'd see him again.

The next Sunday he came to our worship service and sat in the front row. He talked with me afterwards and asked where we got our material. I told him about the Bible, and he got a New Testament. He had never read a New Testament in his life. He started getting up early, and he read 20 or 30 pages of the Bible every day. He came back to church the next week and the next. We kept talking, and he started thinking about making a decision to believe in Christ. It would be a costly thing for him because of his heritage—his family told him if he became a Christian he would be dead to them. But he finally said yes to God.

The last time I saw him he was with a friend. He threw his arms around me and said to his friend, "I want you to meet the person who helped bring me to Jesus."

I almost missed that because I almost said no for him.