Rev. Barkley Thompson is an Episcopal priest in Little Rock, Arkansas. In one of his sermons, he shares a moment of life-changing grace that led him to become a follower of Jesus Christ.

He writes, “Sitting in a musty gothic classroom at the University of Chicago, a Lutheran friend named Jay Alanis looked me squarely in the eye and said, ‘Barkley, God is here, doing something with you.’

‘No Jay,’ I responded, ‘I’m too much a heathen for God.’

‘But Barkley,’ Jay pursued with a light behind his eyes that wasn’t his own, ‘It’s heathens God calls.’”