Cardiac Arrest at Bob Evans

My wife and I were on our way back from a short vacation in southern Ohio when we stopped at Bob Evans in Lodi, Ohio. We were seated at our table in the restaurant and shortly thereafter an elderly man sitting at a nearby booth collapsed.

Someone asked the man's son, "Is everything OK?" and the man's son frantically said "No!" His father was in full cardiac arrest. A group of local pastors were eating at this restaurant and one of them got up and pulled the man out of the booth, yelled, "Someone call 911!" ripped open his shirt, and started performing CPR.

The man's son said they were returning from the Cleveland Clinic where his father had just received a Cortisone shot an hour earlier.

The pastor who was attending to this man could be seen pumping on his chest and the elderly man would resume show sign of a breath, and then the pastor continued CPR. It seemed like forever for the Lodi Volunteer Fire Department to arrive.

When the volunteer fire department finally showed up, they continued attending to the man and motioned to bring an IV. While they were attending to the man, his son was outside on the cell phone. I kept debating on whether to go out and I finally just got out of my seat and went outside and gave the man a gospel tract and said, "Here, PLEASE read this." The man said to me, "We're all Christians. We're all saved." He folded up my gospel tract in his hand and I'm not what he did with it.

The man was put on a stretcher and wheeled out. One of the pastors came back in and asked for everyone's attention in the restaurant and asked everyone to put aside their different religions and to pray for this man. One of the pastors (I'm not sure if the same one) led us in a prayer for this man.

While he was praying, I felt the urge to get up after he had finished and use this as a springboard into the law and gospel presentation, but I didn't. As my wife and I were nearing the end of our meal, the four pastors were on their way out and I showed them Obama Trillions Gospel Tracts and asked them if they were familiar with Way of the Master or Ray Comfort.

I quickly went through the Gospel presentation. I told him that I had been able to share the Gospel with him in one minute. I suggested he look into Way of the Master for his church if they were interested in evangelism.

I do not know the status of the elderly man, but I pray that he is OK. I didn't have time to dig to see if the man's son was soundly saved, but if he isn't, I hope he reads the gospel tract and get's right with God. I hope his father survives, but more importantly, that his father has a right relationship with Jesus.

Had I known this man would go into a cardiac arrest, I would have gone up to him as soon as I entered the restaurant and checked to see if he was saved. I would have been viewed as nuts, but I have to ask myself, why am I not this urgent all the time? This just reminds me how fragile human life is and how we aren't guaranteed tomorrow. Our human life is only a spec compared to our eternity.

5 tracts distributed so far today- one to the elderly man's son and the four to the pastors.