Jim Daly Christian Blog and Commentary

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The Commercial That Led Them to Christ

  • Jim Daly Jim Daly is president and chief executive officer of Focus on the Family, a non-profit organization dedicated to helping families thrive.
  • Published Jan 20, 2012

Posted by Jim_Daly Jan 19, 2012

 

 

 

I want to share an exciting postscript to Monday’s piece, Some Numbers Are More Important Than a Score.

In the process of providing some background and detail on our commercial featuring the Bible verse John 3:16, I noted that we had received some remarkable news about a simple two-line tweet. It read:

Both my sons just saw your commercial and gave their lives to Christ as a result. Thank you. #John316

The father in question was named David Grumme. But that was all we knew about him. So, Karla Dial, the managing editor of Citizenlink and a deft interviewer as well as a talented writer, decided to track him down. I'm so glad she did.

Dave Grumme is from Sugarland, Texas. He’s a Seahawks fan (I won’t hold that against him!) and his two boys are Cameron, 8, and Jaden, 6.

Here now is Karla’s interview:

Q: So what was going on at your house Saturday night?

A:  It seemed like an interesting game. I watched the Broncos beat the Steelers, so I was looking forward to seeing them beat the Patriots, too. So we were just sitting in our living room on the couch, watching the game with the boys. Generally, I tune out commercials. But when it becomes the playoffs and the Super Bowl, sometimes the commercials become part of the feature. In this case we happened to be paying attention when your commercial came on, and I’m really glad we were.

I was like, “Oh, that’s great, that Focus would be running a commercial now. What a great opportunity to reach a lot of people.” I understand there were quite a few people watching that game.

Then the boys started commenting on the commercial, because they were paying attention too. They’re young boys, so they’re kind of halfway paying attention to the football game as it is. But they stopped what they were doing, watched that commercial and started commenting on it. Then Jaden, my younger boy, said, “Well … I want to have everlasting life.” So I just stopped and looked at him, and said, “Well, let’s go take care of that.”

Q: So what did you do after that?

A:I took him to a quieter part of the house and had a long conversation with him about who God is and who Jesus is. He’s grown up in church and we’ve been talking about the Lord with our kids all their lives, so he knew a lot of what I was presenting him with, but I wanted to give him the full context when it came to how to have everlasting life. So I basically laid it all out for him and asked him if he was ready and if that was what he wanted to do, and he said yes. So I started out and told him I was going to have him talk to Jesus, and he said OK. So I prayed, and then he prayed, and it was really sweet. He said, “Dear Jesus, I ask you to forgive my sins. I want you to come live in my heart and follow you all of my life.”  I closed us in prayer and blessed him, and asked him if he had any questions. He said, “What happens if I do something bad?” He had some really great questions.

Then I went down and talked to my older boy and told him what my younger son had done and asked him if he had any questions, if he was ready for that as well, and he said, "Yes." So we just basically went and did the same thing. So they both came to Christ that night.

Q: It must be a real privilege for you as a father to have the opportunity to pray that prayer with your own kids.

A:It absolutely is. We’ve been waiting for this day for a while. But we wanted there to be evidence that that was something they felt a need for and wanted for themselves, and we knew there’d come a time when they’d ask those questions. I thought it was really great that that commercial is what provoked that response,that that was what they wanted. They were exposed to that in church every week and in our home, so I was curious what was it about that commercial that made him decide he wanted everlasting life. So I asked my son about it the next morning, and he said, “I saw other kids my age that were excited about Jesus.”

Q: What kind of changes have you seen in your kids this week? We realize they’re young, so it might not be dramatic.

A:There is, absolutely. Both my wife and I have caught it separately — them reminding each other that Jesus is in our heart now, so we need to act accordingly. They put it in their own language — you shouldn’t be doing that because Jesus is in our heart. Things like that. We’ll talk to them and go a little deeper as they’re able.

I’d just like you guys to know how thankful we are that you’d spend the money to put that ad out. I don’t know what it cost you guys, but it had an impact on us. That’s why I sent that Tweet out in the first place. Many times we are not aware of the impact we have. We’ll create communications pieces and videos and send them out, but very rarely do we ever hear back  the impact that we had. I just wanted you to be aware that it had eternal impact for my sons, and just a profound impact for our family, and we’re just very grateful that you did that.

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