When I first met one-on-one with Ashley she was sitting in the Gallagher Student Union at Xavier University eating a Subway sandwich. Ashley was a freshman on the women’s basketball team at the time. During that appointment, I laid out the gospel before her using the bridge diagram along with Romans 6:23.
For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Ashley and I met several times over the course of her freshman year. I did a lot of explaining of the grace of God and how Jesus died for her. I was thrilled when one of our student leaders who followed Ashley on twitter showed me his phone. The tweet said that Ashley had finally made the decision to follow Christ. When we met after that she told me that the time I invested in her understanding the truth of the gospel was necessary for her to make the decision to give her heart to Jesus.
Ashley grew a lot her sophomore year, came faithfully to my Bible study and went to a great church. She was totally dedicated to growing in Christ. It was obvious to me that Jesus was the most important person in her life.
This past summer she went to Brazil with Athletes in Action and represented the USA in the FISU games. She came home with a gold medal. She even showed me a video of her giving her testimony in front of sixty of the other athletes of how she became a Christian. I was thrilled when she shared about the lasting impact our time together studying Romans 6:23 the year before had on her life and influenced her decision to give her life to Christ.
Currently Ashley is making an impact by leading a discipleship Bible study on campus with six female athletes from all various Xavier sports teams. She is also helping teach our Equipped to Multiply Curriculum to our future leaders.
“There is a quote someone shared with me this summer,” Ashley told me. “I am not afraid of failure, I am afraid of succeeding at something that doesn’t matter.” She went on to say, “The things of this Earth are so unimportant in the grand scheme of things. But, the things we do on this Earth to prepare us for eternity are much more important. Let us live every day to help somebody else see their eternity.”
