How Grace Moved Us Toward Jesus

Summary

Podcast Summary: Living Influence with Bill Thrall and Scott Boyd
Episode: How Grace Moved Us Toward Jesus
Release Date: June 26, 2025

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Introduction

In the episode titled "How Grace Moved Us Toward Jesus," co-hosts Bill Thrall and Scott Boyd delve deep into the transformative power of grace in their personal journeys toward faith. Rooted in the scripture Titus 2:11, "The grace of God hath appeared, bringing salvation to all people," the discussion emphasizes the profound impact of understanding one's identity in Christ and how this realization shapes their influence in the world.

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Personal Journeys to Grace

Bill Thrall's Story

Bill begins by sharing his tumultuous introduction to the concept of grace and salvation. Growing up in a family devoid of faith, his first encounter with Christian teachings occurred at a young age through his father-in-law, Gus Quint. At seven years old, Bill was invited to Bible camp by Gus, despite his family's financial struggles. This experience was marred by fear-inducing messages about hell, leading Bill to accept Jesus multiple times a day out of fear rather than genuine understanding or belief.

Bill [02:31]: "That was my introduction to it... But that was my introduction to it."

This fear-based approach left Bill feeling that his life lacked meaning, a sentiment that persisted until his older brothers, who had also embraced Christianity fervently, invited him to work with them in Wisconsin. It was during this period that Bill's perspective shifted from fear to a genuine desire to know Jesus personally. A pivotal moment occurred on August 11, 1957, when his brother Bob confronted him with a simple yet profound question:

Bob [06:00]: "What are you gonna do with Jesus?"

This question led Bill to a heartfelt prayer where he expressed his desire to invite Jesus into his life, moving beyond the superficial fear of hell to a transformative relationship with Christ.

Scott Boyd's Story

Scott shares a contrasting yet equally profound journey. Unlike Bill, Scott's early exposure to faith was inconsistent. Raised in a Lutheran household with a strained relationship with church activities, his initial experiences were unremarkable and lacked personal significance. However, his perspective began to change when he met his wife, Bev, a Southern Baptist, and was exposed to different facets of Christian worship and community.

Scott [09:26]: "I was 20... and I felt like he told me, no, you need to get your degree."

Scott's encounter with his stepmother's unwavering faith and the vibrant community of a non-denominational church ignited a passionate and authentic faith in him. Unlike his early experiences, where faith felt obligatory, this new environment offered genuine relationships and a lively expression of worship that resonated deeply with him.

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Key Discussions: Grace as a Personal Encounter

Both Bill and Scott emphasize that true grace extends beyond mere messages about salvation; it is an experiential relationship with Jesus. They reiterate that making salvation a mere message can inadvertently condemn people, whereas focusing on Jesus as a person allows individuals to experience grace authentically.

Bill [12:25]: "It's interesting, both of us... Grace is about a person. His name is Jesus."

The hosts discuss how their personal relationships and encounters with believers shaped their understanding of grace. Bill recounts his experiences in Bible college and his early evangelistic efforts, highlighting a pivotal moment where his preaching was met with unexpected resistance, leading him to realize the importance of conveying grace through the person of Jesus rather than a judgmental message.

Bill [15:07]: "A guy in the second row starts swearing at me... as he started to walk up, I said, 'Wait, wait, stop, stop, stop.'"

This incident taught Bill the significance of embodying grace and approaching evangelism with humility and authenticity, focusing on personal transformation rather than fear-based rhetoric.

Scott echoes this sentiment, sharing how his journey was less about bold evangelism and more about developing a heartfelt relationship with Jesus, supported by a community that valued genuine faith over traditional, rigid expressions of Christianity.

Scott [19:15]: "I felt like he told me, no, you need to get your degree... Make these people those priority."

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Insights: Transformative Power of Personal Relationships

A recurring theme in the episode is the transformative influence of personal relationships in understanding and embracing grace. Both hosts credit their respective brothers and family members for modeling authentic faith, which in turn fostered their own spiritual growth.

Bill's interaction with his brothers, especially the impactful summer spent working alongside them, revealed a new dimension of faith—one that was lived out with integrity and genuine love, rather than just preached.

Scott's relationship with his stepmother and the vibrant non-denominational church community provided him with a model of faith that was both passionate and relatable, encouraging him to pursue his spiritual and personal growth seriously.

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Conclusions: Embracing Grace as a Personal Experience

Bill and Scott converge on the idea that grace must be experienced personally to be truly transformative. By shifting the focus from salvation as a mere message to salvation through a personal relationship with Jesus, they argue that individuals can experience authentic grace that leads to meaningful change and influence in their lives.

Bill [17:59]: "Now I can clearly say I met God that day."

They conclude that understanding grace as a personal encounter with Jesus is essential for genuine spiritual growth and effective influence, aligning with their podcast's overarching theme that one's view of themselves profoundly impacts their ability to influence others.

Bill [18:17]: "Because of what we talked about last week. Because he who was the only means to salvation did something. He brought something to us. He brought grace to us."

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Final Thoughts

In "How Grace Moved Us Toward Jesus," Bill Thrall and Scott Boyd share heartfelt narratives that illustrate the profound impact of experiencing grace through personal relationships and authentic encounters with Jesus. Their stories serve as a testament to the transformative power of faith when it is lived out with sincerity and love, reinforcing the podcast's message that understanding one's identity in Christ is paramount to influencing the world positively.

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Notable Quotes

• Bill [02:31]: "That was my introduction to it... But that was my introduction to it."
• Bill [06:00]: "What are you gonna do with Jesus?"
• Bill [12:25]: "It's interesting, both of us... Grace is about a person. His name is Jesus."
• Bill [15:07]: "A guy in the second row starts swearing at me... as he started to walk up, I said, 'Wait, wait, stop, stop, stop.'"
• Scott [09:26]: "I was 20... and I felt like he told me, no, you need to get your degree."
• Bill [17:59]: "Now I can clearly say I met God that day."
• Bill [18:17]: "Because of what we talked about last week. Because he who was the only means to salvation did something. He brought something to us. He brought grace to us."

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Conclusion

This episode of "Living Influence" beautifully encapsulates the essence of discovering grace through personal relationships and authentic faith experiences. Bill and Scott's candid sharing offers listeners a relatable and inspiring perspective on how grace can profoundly shape one's life and influence.

Transcript

[Bill]

Foreign.

[Scott]

The only means for our salvation.

[Bill]

Amen. Great question.

[Scott]

Welcome to living influence. So, Bill, we going to continue this conversation on grace? Yeah, I think we're in week three. We're going to start with the scripture. Titus 2:11. The grace of God hath appeared, bringing salvation to all people.

[Bill]

Amen. Just pause for a minute, think about that, talk about grace. We've already talked a lot about God full of grace. He's a reason for it. One of the reasons for it is to bring it to all people.

[Bev]

Yeah.

[Bill]

Including you and me. So as we think about that, let's. Let's be thinking about. I want to tell you about my story, my discovery of grace for my salvation.

[Scott]

Right.

[Bill]

Yeah. I was a. I grew up in a family. We had no faith except for cousins and aunts and uncles dying. Grandparents never went to church. A man named Gus Quint, who by God's grace later became my father in law. But I was only seven at the time. He invited a couple of my two older brothers to go to a boys club. At the boys club, they were invited to go to Bible camp that next summer. It cost $8 and 50 cents each.

[Bev]

To go to Bible.

[Bill]

To go to Bible camp. And they. Our family didn't have any money. Now, I'm not going to tell you I have a prescribed way to lead people to Christ. But I want to tell you this story. It's one of my favorite family stories. They didn't have any money, so my brother Al robbed a store of $22 so they can go to Bible camp. In that Bible camp, my brother Bob for the first time heard about Jesus as the Savior and learned about getting saved by grace. And he came home to tell us honestly, if you'd have been in our home, everybody walked around for two days with this. Look at our faces, like what happened to Bob? Because we'd never heard it before, never heard the message. But this character Gus showed up to our home many times and he invited me to camp.

[Bev]

Yeah.

[Bill]

Well, now I'm. Now I'm eight years old, way too young for camp. But he took me anyway.

[Bev]

Yeah.

[Bill]

And. And they did something at camp. They scared the hell out of me.

[Scott]

Yes.

[Bill]

Because every night there was a message that if you don't accept Jesus, you're going to go to hell, fire and brimstone.

[Bev]

Yeah.

[Bill]

But they. They taught another thing in, in the context of all of that they taught. This really scared me that if you don't accept Jesus and he comes back, the Christians will all be gone. And if you're not Gone, you know, you're going to hell. Scared me because I thought, oh, my gosh, I better become a Christian, because otherwise I'm going to go to hell. But if Jesus comes back, I'm not ready. I'm going to go to hell. Honestly, I accepted Jesus oh, three, four times a day at camp, several times during the night when I'd wake up. And it's like I slept with one eye open because I knew my consul was a Christian. And if I woke up at night and he was still there, good, I'm going to make it.

[Scott]

Scared you that much?

[Bill]

Oh, it really, really frightened me.

[Bev]

Yeah.

[Bill]

By the way, that's, that's not a healthy message. I just thought I'd mention that. But that was my introduction to it.

[Bev]

Yeah.

[Bill]

Now, in the process of that, I was not fully, not even nearly fully understanding what it was like to accept Jesus. I was just afraid of hell. There wasn't anything about a savior or anything about sin. It was just okay. And then what happens is you kind of get passive about it and you hope it was true. Well, for me, we went to Sunday school and I heard the Bible stories and all of that, and I just kind of felt that my life didn't matter. It felt the same to me.

[Bev]

Yeah.

[Bill]

And then, and then my, my older brothers, these two guys who robbed the store to go to Bible camp, are now pastors, and they invite me to work with him with them one summer up in Wisconsin painting houses because that's how they made their living. And they were fanatics for Jesus.

[Bev]

Yeah.

[Bill]

I knew they were going to embarrass the snot out of me. I knew it. But I needed a job. So I said to Al, al, I'll work with you guys, but you gotta promise you're not gonna preach to me every day. Yeah, I, I, you know, I already know about Jesus. Well, he was faithful. He didn't do that. He prepared 10 other guys to do it, but he didn't do it. But all summer long, every Saturday night, my brothers would go down to skid row in Milwaukee. They had these huge horns that my brother had gotten from an airport somewhere. And they would blast this music down the street and all the bars would open. The prostitute come out, windows of the sea. And they'd all be yelling at my brother, and he'd be preaching Jesus Christ. But you know what really impressed me about that summer? Not the message, but the men. My brother and my brothers and their, and his, My brother was married, one brother. They, they, they lived a different life. There was A reality in them that I didn't know about.

[Scott]

You saw something different?

[Bill]

Oh, some. A reality I didn't experience that you.

[Scott]

Didn'T see in your family.

[Bill]

I knew it.

[Scott]

It was different.

[Bill]

It was different.

[Bev]

Yeah.

[Bill]

And then my. My brother, one day in August, in fact, I remember it was August 11, 1957, 17 years old, comes around the window of the house and he says, bill comes around the corner of the house and painting a window, and he says, bill, I just have one question for you. What are you gonna do with Jesus?

[Bev]

Yeah.

[Bill]

And then the message of grace became.

[Scott]

A person for you.

[Bill]

For me.

[Bev]

Wow.

[Bill]

And then I knew I needed that person.

[Scott]

Isn't that interesting?

[Bill]

That was beautiful. Yeah, it was beautiful for me, Scott. And I. I went to my brother's home and I knelt at the couch with him. I wasn't afraid of going to hell anymore, but I really wanted to know this person. And I can honestly say. And I wanted him to know me. I literally wanted to give Jesus my life. And I remember when I was in high school, there were five or six kids in my big high school who were Christians. They carried their Bibles. That's how you know they were Christians. And they were the saddest kids in the whole school. Nobody was more miserable than those five or six kids. And that hit me negatively, in a super negative way. And I remember the very day that I accepted Jesus, I remember part of my prayer. I'll never forget it. I said these words, I'm inviting the eternal God into my life. It has to make a difference. What I was thinking was, it can't be that reality. There's got to be a reality, different.

[Scott]

Reality besides what you saw.

[Bill]

It was the reality I saw in my brother Al. I saw in my brother Bob. And I prayed to receive the Lord. And I cried that day. And I'm going to say this in a way that nobody thinks, like I'm bragging. It's not a bragging statement. I just want to make this statement. Fortunately, because I've met lots of people, this isn't true, but fortunately for me, Scott, I have lived lots of years since then, but I've never doubted my salvation.

[Bev]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Scott]

I never did this relationship with Al.

[Bev]

You.

[Scott]

You saw something in him.

[Bill]

Absolutely.

[Scott]

That was different.

[Bill]

Absolutely.

[Bev]

And.

[Scott]

And then that led you to meet. Meet Jesus.

[Bill]

Absolutely.

[Scott]

Which then changed everything for me.

[Bev]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Bill]

Tell me about your story.

[Scott]

So my story, I grew up part of my life, not going to a good portion of my early years. My mother took us to a Lutheran church. I never don't remember not believing that there was a God. I never don't remember not believing that there was a Jesus. But it wasn't my life. It was kind of a thing you did over here. And so then I go off to college and go to church a few times. And then I met this girl that I ended up marrying. And as we were courting, she was Southern Baptist. I would go to her church and there'd be a preacher up there and he would be having his Bible in this hand and he'd be yelling in this hand. And he would just work himself to a frenzy and then get really quiet to deliver the punchline. It was so stereotypical. I just like. And then, you know, then they'd sing just as I am at the end of every service so that someone would go down the aisle to get saved and.

[Bill]

Right.

[Scott]

And I'm like, I can't do this. Oh my gosh, I can't do this. And Bev would go with me to church and we went to this traditional, Missouri centered, very conservative Lutheran church. And they had organs, an organ in the church, and they played these songs that were written in the 1400s and you could hardly sing them and figure out where the melody was. And Bev's like, I can't do this. Then as we got serious and were meeting each other's families, I take Bev to go meet my dad. He lived in Arkansas. My dad was an alcoholic and he had married a woman, Jean, I think it was her third marriage. She had three daughters, I had three stepsisters. But Jean really ended up with this very close relationship with Jesus. And so we go visit them. Their church is the weirdest thing we ever. I mean, it was like seven people. It was a tiny little church in a theater where it was bad. It was really bad. It was almost. It was embarrassing for me. But Bev and I came back and we were affected by Jane's relationship with Jesus.

[Bill]

Amen.

[Scott]

It's like she talks to him and he talks to her. And it affected us that we got in the Yellow Pages and go, well, let's see if we can find a non denominational church. Because we didn't like the Baptist church and we didn't like the Lutheran church. And so we found one that it started in the middle 70s, this is probably 1980 when we found it. So it had been five years old. And we found a group of ex hippies, I guess you would say.

[Bill]

I'm familiar with that.

[Scott]

And these people had so much passion for Jesus.

[Bill]

Amen.

[Scott]

For their Faith. And it was palpable. It was like real. I mean.

[Bill]

Yeah.

[Scott]

I remember going. And the worship was intense. Amazing. I would be embarrassed when they danced to this one song. You know, they dance in church. And somehow Bev and I found life there. We found friends there, we found relationships there. And my faith became alive. And we began to just. I mean, I remember reading, reading the Bible in no time. Just so excited about what God was doing. And he. And he began to shape our lives. And so.

[Bill]

Amen.

[Scott]

So I don't have a day where I can tell you when I was saved.

[Bill]

Right.

[Scott]

There were lots of times I responded.

[Bill]

Amen.

[Scott]

But that was my journey.

[Bill]

Amen. Thank you. It's interesting, both of us, because we'd not shared this before, but both of us made a big point of a big point. Grace is about a person. His name is Jesus.

[Bev]

Yeah.

[Bill]

Tragically, we make salvation a message. And when we make salvation a message, we condemn people.

[Bev]

Yeah.

[Bill]

But when we make it a person.

[Bev]

Right.

[Bill]

He came and as many as received him.

[Bev]

Yeah.

[Bill]

Them and that.

[Scott]

And that's an experience.

[Bill]

Exactly. Experiencing grace because you experience a person.

[Bev]

Right.

[Bill]

And so it's like.

[Scott]

And in both of our stories, we experienced a human first.

[Bill]

Yes. Yeah.

[Scott]

My brother, my stepmom.

[Bill]

Your stepmom.

[Bev]

Yeah.

[Bill]

And that's true of so many people, Scott.

[Bev]

Yeah.

[Bill]

It's true of so many people.

[Bev]

Yeah.

[Bill]

So what happens to this character is that I'm now a believer in a person whose name is Jesus. And I'm experiencing grace before I even understand what I'm experiencing.

[Bev]

Yeah.

[Bill]

My life is being transformed. My motives, my actions. I'm in Bible college now.

[Bev]

Yeah.

[Bill]

And I'm in Bible college. And from those early days till way 15 years later, 20 years later, there's a single motivation in my heart and that's to introduce Jesus to as many people as I can.

[Bev]

Yeah.

[Bill]

And even as a 17 year old kid in Bible college, I would go down to the rescue missions in downtown Chicago to. Just because I knew those people needed Jesus because my brothers worked on skid row. So I know those are similar people. I didn't know everybody needed them, but I know those people did.

[Bev]

Yeah.

[Bill]

I have a funny story to tell you.

[Bev]

I.

[Bill]

So I'm 17 and I go to this mission and the lady who runs it's like 5ft tall, 100 pounds maybe. And this place is just full of these men who have been on the street. They come in and she makes them listen to a message before she feeds them. That's the way she works it. So they're all sitting in these wooden pews and there's maybe 80, 90 of them. And I'm up there and. And I'm going to share the gospel with these guys.

[Scott]

And. Oh my gosh.

[Bill]

And I got up and I'm like that Baptist preacher talking about it. I'm. You guys are all sinners.

[Bev]

Yeah.

[Bill]

And something happened that never happened before. Something I didn't expect to happen. Nobody told me this could happen. A guy in the second row stands.

[Bev]

Up.

[Bill]

And starts swearing at me. Who are you to tell me that I'm a sinner? Remember I told you the lady was five feet tall? This guy's six five.

[Bev]

Yeah.

[Bill]

And I'm 61 and a solid 150.

[Bev]

Yeah.

[Bill]

I'm going, I'm going to die right now for the gospel. But, but, but as he started to walk up, I. I said, wait, wait, stop, stop, stop. I'm sorry, I didn't mean this. I didn't mean that to sound like I said that. I should have told you. God said that. I should have told you. God said that. I made it sound like I said that. God said that. Do you know God said that, that we are all sinners, we're all separated from God. And I started repeating my message. And this big old huge guy, he comes by the grace of God and he sits right here on the first step, right below me. It sits there the whole time. I'm preaching like a little kid and I'm going, oh, God, you just saved my life. I'm going to keep preaching. But, but my whole experience, God was to tell as many people as I could about this Jesus who is the Savior.

[Bev]

Yeah.

[Bill]

I was learning. We were learning together. We were all about evangelism and we were learning. And you know what happens when Jesus is the focus of your gospel message? People get introduced to the person of God.

[Bev]

Yeah.

[Bill]

And they don't get introduced to the message that scares them. That they might go to hell. Yeah, they might. Sinners go to hell.

[Bev]

Yeah.

[Bill]

But see, what Jesus did is that Jesus came to be a man, to go to a place called Calvary so that I could know God. And so when I accepted Jesus that.

[Bev]

Day.

[Bill]

Now I can clearly say I met God that day. And in my simple prayer as a 17 year old, I wondered and pondered. It's got to make a difference. I couldn't have imagined. I could not have imagined. Scott, when we are faithful to say that grace is the only means to salvation and his name is Jesus, nobody can comprehend what this Jesus, who is God can do. In a life that trusts him.

[Bev]

Right.

[Bill]

Nobody can do that.

[Bev]

Yeah.

[Bill]

At 17 years old, I could not have imagined that the faithful God, when I choose to trust him, would perform miracles of his purposes in me.

[Bev]

Now.

[Bill]

So when we ask the question, is grace the only means to salvation? The answer is yes. Why? Because of what we talked about last week. Because he who was the only means to salvation did something. He brought something to us. He brought grace to us.

[Bev]

Right.

[Bill]

The gospel message, when it's about Jesus, is about a person who can meet by every need and, oh, by the way, who loves me.

[Bev]

Yeah.

[Bill]

That's my awareness that grace is the means to my salvation.

[Bev]

Yeah.

[Bill]

We're going to keep talking about grace for a few weeks, but I wanted. For me. And we can both keep talking about. For me. I want to just make sure we hear this. That day at 17, I was accepting a savior. And since then, I've learned that that Savior was about transforming me into a saint. That's called grace.

[Bev]

Yeah.

[Scott]

That's amazing. I was. For me, I was 20.

[Bev]

Yeah.

[Scott]

And I. I would have to say I didn't come out of the box as bold as you. I wasn't. Evangelism wasn't my strength.

[Bill]

Yeah.

[Scott]

It wasn't a strength of mine. Wasn't. I mean, I was too insecure, too.

[Bev]

I don't know.

[Scott]

But it. But my meeting with Jesus, it did change the course of my life.

[Bill]

Amen.

[Scott]

I asked if I should go to Bible college. I felt like he told me, no, you need to get your degree. No, you need to really go for.

[Bev]

It, you know, And.

[Scott]

And then I. Then I felt like he said, you should make a priority. The people you go to church with, and they should be a priority over where your career is going to be. Trust me with your career. Make these people those priority.

[Bill]

I like that.

[Scott]

And so we did that. And I mean, I had. We had so much opposition when we did that. We had family saying, you know, God's in the other cities, too.

[Bill]

Yeah. But the fellowship is in this city.

[Scott]

Our friends, our. Our support, our. Our connections.

[Bill]

Right.

[Scott]

Our community.

[Bev]

Right.

[Scott]

It was amazing how God worked through that for me.

[Bill]

Amen. And has blessed you.

[Bev]

Yeah.

[Bill]

Both worlds.

[Bev]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Bill]

Thank God for his grace.

[Scott]

I know. And.

[Bev]

Yeah.

[Scott]

And now here I'm on a podcast with you. Whoever could figure that out? Kind of crazy.

[Bill]

Raised by his grace.

[Bev]

It is. It is.

[Bill]

Amen.

[Scott]

All right, well, thank you for joining us. We're going to continue this conversation about grace. Next week. We're going to talk about. Grace is a primary gift for me.

[Bill]

Amen.

[Scott]

And so we hope that you continue.

[Bill]

Amen.

[Scott]

Thanks for listening. Thank you for listening to the podcast. We're really glad that you're here. We'd love to know that you're here. And so if you could leave a comment, we would appreciate that. But more importantly, if you know someone that should listen to this or hear it, we would love for you to share it with them. Thanks again.