Based on a true story.

Pete, Joe and Mike openly mocked when Stan came into their hospital ward.

      “Hey, Doug,” Joe called. “Yer old man is here. Do you think he’s gonna preach a sermon today?”

      Doug glowered, but dropped his eyes when his father looked at him.

       He muttered a few curses but managed to add “Hi, Dad,” when the tall, thin man sat down stiffly beside him.

  Doug sighed: another hour of enduring his father’s obvious discomfort with how his fellow Aids patients acted up. He knew without a doubt their actions were more unnatural, their language filthier when his father came around.

  Doug scowled.  Why couldn’t he just bug off?  Just because I’m his son and dying of this creepy disease is no reason for him to stick around.

    “You, okay, son?” He must of heard me sigh. 

    “Same as usual: no better, no worse,” he lied, although he knew perfectly well his life was ebbing away from him.

   “Is there anything I can do to help?” Stan sat with his hands tightly folded on his lap and Doug, as well as several others took note of the look of revulsion marring his features. 

Ya, Doug thought, just once you can get that awful nauseated look off your face and treat me like a human.

  What he didn’t know, however, was how desperately Stan was praying for compassion, for understanding, towards the Aids' Victims.Gradually God opened Stan's eyes to the people around him. He saw first the sores, and wondered how painful they were, but at  almost the same instant  it hit him how gaunt these people were.It took him awhile longer to make eye contact, but that was when his heart really began to melt.. 

   Even the most cynical could tell that Stan was changing. He was still quiet and dignified, but began to speak to them by name, and that with gentle respect! He ever shook their hands when he greeted them.  

  Stan continued to visit his son on a daily basis, and the men could tell that he sincerely cared about them as individuals. First one then another responded to the obvious love they felt from him, and some even started unburdening their hearts.

Doug was not at all immune to the softening he felt in his dad. One day he broke down and confessed a fear of dying.

 “Dad,” he wept, “I need Jesus, but I’m so afraid He won’t accept me because I have sinned so badly."

   While the others listened in, Stan convinced his son that it was for people such as Doug that Jesus had laid down His life, so that he could be forgiven, so that he could be free and go to Heaven someday.

   Doug made such a complete change, and was so obviously at peace with God and man after he confessed his sin, that no one tried to dissuade him.  It was considered unusual how peacefully he died under the circumstances.

  Both the hospital staff and the patients were deeply impressed with the caring Stan showed, but Jesus helped him.