Like Ripples in a Pond

During our fellowship gathering we were wondering about what influence any one believer might have in the world, perhaps without knowing it, just by being faithful and available to Jesus. I then came across the following story, written by Dick Innes in Encounter magazine for September/October 2001 (Vol. 32 No. 9/10). I thought it particularly apt in the light of the recent celebrations of the life of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

Think, too, of the amazing events of recent years and how they were affected by the action of one person.

For example, ‘19 August 2001 was the tenth anniversary of the final
downfall of international communism in the former Soviet Union. Some of you may
remember that historic event. A group of Russian generals were determined to
turn back the tide of democracy in that declining empire. They placed Mikhail
Gorbachev under house arrest at his dacha outside of Moscow. Meanwhile a tank
rumbled into Red square with the sole purpose of capturing second-in-command,
Boris Yeltsin. But Yeltsin did something quite extraordinary. Instead of
acquiescing to his captors, he leapt atop the tank and welcomed the tank
commander over to the side of democracy.

‘Later the tank commander reported that, up to this point, he had no
intention of joining the forces of democracy, but Yeltsin was so persuasive that
he could not resist. And with that single event, communism lost its final
prospect of a return to power.

‘A reporter interviewed Boris Yeltsin not long after that famous
incident. The reporter asked Yeltsin what gave him the courage to take that
stand. Yeltsin credited reading the story of Lech Walesa, the Gdansk electrician
who led the forces of Solidarity and helped bring democracy to Poland several
years before.

‘Someone asked Walesa what caused him to make the stand that brought
down communism in his land. Walesa said he was inspired to his acts of sacrifice
by reading accounts of the late Dr martin Luther King Jnr and the Civil Rights
marchers in the United States.

‘When Dr King was asked what pivotal event spurred him into action as a
leader of his people, he cited the influence of Rosa Parks, the African-American
woman in Montgomery, Alabama, who refused to sit in the back of the bus when
instructed to do so because of her skin colour. Now here is the question for the
day: is it possible that the fall of communism began with one African-American
woman who refused to sit in the back of the bus? (from King Duncan and the staff at www.sermons.com

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I’m sure, if we could ask Rosa Parks who it was that inspired her courage, we could follow the chain back through many often seemingly insignificant acts of courage and self-sacrifice - leading eventually to the event of Jesus hanging on the cross outside of Jerusalem.