Eternity

Thanks to Kurt Skelley who told this story at the Men’s Prayer Advance 2019.

In 1932, a preacher named John G. Ridley preached a message in Sydney, Australia, entitled, “The Echoes of Eternity.” The sermon was based on Isaiah 57:15:

For thus saith the high and lofty One that inhabiteth eternity, whose name is Holy; I dwell in the high and holy place, with him also that is of a contrite and humble spirit, to revive the spirit of the humble, and to revive the heart of the contrite ones.

In that message, he said:

Eternity, Eternity, I wish that I could sound or shout that word to everyone in the streets of Sydney. You’ve got to meet it, where will you spend Eternity?

A man named Arthur Stace was listening to that message. He was an alcoholic who had been saved two years earlier. He was illiterate. But he couldn’t get that message out of his mind.  He spent the next 35 years writing the word, “Eternity” in script on sidewalks throughout the city of Sydney.

It is estimated that he chalked that word over 500,000 times in those years.