Ladies and gentlemen, this is one of the shortest sermons ever preached, but it might be one of the most effective.

It's only about two minutes long.

It comes from about a hundred years ago.

A man by the name of James Allen Francis preached it.

It's called One Solitary Life, and it's about Jesus. Here it is,

maybe two minutes. He was born in an obscure village, the child of a peasant. He grew up in

another village where he worked in a carpenter shop until he was 30. Then for three years,

he was an itinerant preacher.

He never wrote a book. He never held office. He never had a family or owned a home. He didn't go

to college. He never lived in a big city. He never traveled 200 miles from the place where he was

born. He did none of the things that normally or usually

accompany greatness. He had no credentials but himself. He was only 33 when the tide of public opinion

turned against him. His friends ran away. One of them denied him. He was turned over to his enemies and went through the mockery of a

trial. He was nailed to a cross between two thieves. While he was dying, his executioners

gambled for his garments, the only property he had on earth. When he was dead, he was laid in a

borrowed grave through the pity of a friend.

Twenty centuries have come and gone, and today he is the central figure of the human race.

I am well within the mark when I say that all the armies that ever marched, all the navies that

ever sailed, all the parliaments that ever sat, all the navies that ever sailed, all the parliaments that ever sat,

all the kings that ever reigned, put together, have not affected the life of man on this earth

as much as that one solitary life, unquote.

Again, that's James Allen Francis from about a hundred years ago.

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