Any person who has listened\u00a0to, read about,\u00a0connected with, or been influenced by Bob Goff will know that his personality speaks\u00a0louder than any book review could. \u00a0Any person that has not heard of Bob (it\u2019s how he prefers to be addressed)\u2026well, they should start with one of his stories.<\/p>\n
The September 11 tragedy had recently struck, so Bob and Sweet Maria (his wife) brought their young children together to help them make sense of what had happened.\u00a0 After talking through the events, Bob and Sweet Maria asked their children what they would like to say, do, or ask if they could meet with the world\u2019s leaders.\u00a0 His youngest explained that they should invite the leaders to spend the night at their house.\u00a0 His middle child suggested that they ask each leader what they hoped for.\u00a0 The oldest said, if need be, the family should go to the world leaders (just in case the sleep-over didn\u2019t fly) and make a video interview of each leader\u2019s response to the hope question.\u00a0 So, Bob took them seriously.\u00a0 He had the kids write a letter to each of the world\u2019s presidents, prime ministers, and dictators (names and addresses gratefully discovered on the CIA\u2019s public website!) asking for an audience \u2013 hundreds and hundreds of letters.\u00a0 As you might expect, Bob\u2019s children received numerous, wonderfully official and polite sounding no-thank-yous.\u00a0 That was the pattern.\u00a0 That is, until the State House of Bulgaria broke the pattern with an equally official invitation to the national palace.\u00a0 Shortly after, the prime minister of Switzerland invited the children to Bern.\u00a0 Then an invitation arrived from the president of Israel in Jerusalem.\u00a0 All told, the children received 29 invitations to meet with heads of state from around the globe \u2013 even one from the Russian government!\u00a0 And, again, Bob and Sweet Maria took their kids seriously.\u00a0 They had made a promise that if any of the leaders offered to meet, the family would accept.\u00a0 I won\u2019t ruin the rest of the story, but suffice it to say, there are a number of world leaders who now hold keys to the front door of the Goff house, and some of these keys have been used.<\/p>\n
I tell this story from Bob\u2019s life for two reasons.\u00a0 First, if you have never met him or heard of him, you now have a glimpse of what is literally, his everyday life.\u00a0 Second, and perhaps more importantly, you also now have an introduction to Love Does<\/em> and the message that Bob seeks to share.\u00a0 Each of Bob\u2019s 34 short chapters starts with an equally engaging story as the one above, and in the final few pages of the chapter, Bob enters the narrative to explain that this \u2013 whatever story he has just told \u2013 is another facet of what love does.\u00a0 You may be adventuring on a humanitarian mission in Africa, or working through the aftermath with the person who nearly killed you when they T-boned your car, but wherever your day has taken you, Bob would like you to know that, in the name of Jesus Christ, love does.\u00a0 It dreams.\u00a0 It dares.\u00a0 It reaches.\u00a0 It goes. \u00a0Love does.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Any person who has listened\u00a0to, read about,\u00a0connected with, or been influenced by Bob Goff will know that his personality speaks\u00a0louder than any book review could. \u00a0Any person that has not heard of Bob (it\u2019s how he prefers to be addressed)\u2026well, … Continue reading