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Verse:“I am the door. If anyone enters by Me, he will be saved, and will go in and out and find pasture.” —John 10:9
In 1914, near the Latin Bridge in Sarajevo in present-day Bosnia and Herzegovina, a desperate act committed by a nineteen-year-old Bosnian changed the course of the world. As a member of an underground military group committed to freeing Bosnia from Austro-Hungarian rule, Gavrilo Princip shot and killed Archduke Franz Ferdinand, the heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne, and his wife, Sophie, the Duchess of Hohenberg. Princip’s murderous moment is credited with starting World War I.* If Franz Ferdinand had not been killed, it is reasonable to assume World War I would not have taken place. Consequently, Adolf Hitler would likely have not been elected to power in Germany, and the horrors of the Holocaust would never have happened.
The world today would be vastly different but for that one murderous deed. One act can have significant ramifications.
In October 1912, former president Theodore Roosevelt survived and assassination attempt at a campaign event in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. He was shot in the chest at point blank range; he not only survived the attempt on his life, but also delivered a ninety-minute speech before accepting medical attention.
The bullet passed through his overcoat, his eyeglass case, and a fifty-page speech he had folded and put in his pocket. He remarked to his hearers, “It takes more than that to kill a bull Moose!”† If Roosevelt had put the speech in another pocket, he would almost certainly have died. Every person alive has the opportunity to make a decision that will alter the course of eternity. With each new day, every life may be yielded to Jesus as Lord and Savior. A simple prayer of surrender turns the life over to Christ, who makes the heart His home and fills the life with His presence.
A simple decision remakes a sinful life, as the grace of Jesus makes a sinner into a “new creation” (2 Corinthians 5:17).
When Jesus returns, the world will be divided into two groups: the saved and the lost. Had they chosen, every lost soul could have been saved.
A decision for Jesus changes the trajectory of a life.
One decision unites a sinner with Jesus for eternity.