Ruth pushed her shopping cart slowly as she searched through the grocery store. She peered down each aisle, on a mission. Turning the corner at the pots and pans, she found what she was looking for.
ClampA young foreign college student was squatting in front of the pots, shopping at the beginning of the semester. “Can I help you?” asked Ruth. The student looked into the eyes of an elderly woman who had a warm smile and countenance that put the student at ease. In broken English, the student explained that he was starting school and needed a pot.
“You are welcome to come to my home, and I will give you some of my pots and pans,” said Ruth.
For years, Ruth and her husband Ted, before he died, “adopted” foreign college students so that they could be an extended family to them. Ruth would meet them through the International Friends program at Clemson University and invite them to her home for meals. She rarely had the invitation turned down, as it was an honor to eat in someone’s home from America. Can you imagine the loneliness one must feel so far from home in a foreign culture?
“We invited them to our home and became friends with them, loved them, and told our new friends about Jesus,” said Ruth. “We checked up on them and became a second family. They would also come to our church, Westminster First Baptist.”
Through the years, they would change the world together, as students from China, Japan and India would confess Jesus as Lord through their witness. There was a Chinese student that Ruth nursed to health following a car accident who confessed Jesus as Lord. He led his wife and young child to Jesus. There was a Japanese student with whom they shared the gospel. Years later, they received a phone call from Taiwan letting them know he had confessed Jesus as Lord.
And there was an engineering student from India who was a devout Hindu. Ruth and Ted’s love for him extended beyond an occasional meal. In times of financial distress, they interceded. When he seemed to be at the end of his rope, they offered a listening ear. When he needed a place to stay, they opened their home to him. He studied the Scriptures, watched their life, and was convinced that Jesus was the Christ. Surrendering to Christ would mean turning his back on his family, but he was compelled to follow Jesus. Now he is a Baptist pastor in our state and one of our strongest prayer warriors.
So if you see Ruth at the grocery store pushing around an empty cart, she may not be looking for food. She may be looking for an opportunity to change the world.
– Clamp is evangelism group director for the South Carolina Baptist Convention. Follow Lee on twitter @leeclamp or on his blog at www.leeclamp.com.