Several years ago I met a new friend, Karen, at a Bible study. She was very sweet and had a very strong faith. Sadly, I learned that she had cancer and probably didn’t have long to live. But she came to Bible study every week. She was delightful! Her faith was palpable.

At one point during the year, she was gone for a few weeks because she was having a new cancer treatment that caused her to have to stay in the hospital. She was trying to live because her son was about to go to college, and she wanted to be with her husband as they took him for his first semester.

After her grueling treatment, she returned to our group and had a story to tell us. She had gone to a grocery store (this was pre-covid) and met a homeless man outside the store. She bought him some food and befriended him. He was grateful. She called a friend from church to ask him to come meet the man. They prayed with him. He accepted Jesus as his Savior. They gave him information about their church and how to continue learning about his new faith.

As she told us the story, her comment afterward has always stayed with me. She said she would have been shy about talking to someone like that in the past, but she was motivated to tell him about Jesus because she wouldn’t be here very much longer.

She said, “What do I have to lose?”

She also found herself with an opportunity to encourage some friends — a married couple. They were on the verge of divorce. Since she didn’t have anything to lose, she boldly challenged them to stay together and seek Christian counseling. They did.

She wished she had the courage before she was sick to be as bold. To stop and befriend homeless people and tell them the good news of Christ. And to lovingly stand up to friends and acquaintances who were straying from God’s will. We were encouraged to live like she had — to be loving and bold when we could be used by God in that way.

The next Bible study year, we were in different groups, but I saw her periodically in the halls. She had become virtually blind. A friend brought her to Bible study every week and led her where she needed to go.

I lost touch with her after that but heard that she lived another year or so, which amazed everyone, including her doctors. But she knew she had purpose and that God was using her while she was living.

May God help us be bold, not shy, about sharing the hope we have with people who need Him.

What do we have to lose?

“For the spirit God gave us does not make us timid but gives us power, love, and self-discipline. So do not be ashamed of the testimony about our Lord . . .” (2 Timothy 1:7)