Hey Sisters and Brothers in Christ,
I hope you had a good day walking with the Lord.  I had a great day on campus as I got to go through the Gospel with two students I had been praying for and Maria prayed to receive Christ.  She has long brown hair, kind of teased-out looking (bit of a bad hair day maybe) and an oval face, nice looking girl.  Maria is Roman Catholic in background and was sitting in a 1st floor lounge in the BIC building.  She said she had already done a survey for a Christian Bible study group.  Campus Crusade, now called Cru, does spiritual interest surveys with students and never tells them the Gospel.  They had a table up like us at the Activity Fair and so I have encountered quite a few students who say they have already done a survey.  With Maria I tried to work around it and asked her what she would say if God asked her why He should let her into Heaven.  She appealed to her good works, so I went through the Gospel with her and she wanted to be forgiven and trust in Christ’s work.  I told her she could pray silently and she said “lets pray together.”  So I prayed it with her, she read really fast.  I gave her a bible study and More than a Carpenter to read and she had to run to class.  But I did get to explain the work of the Holy Spirit in her and give her a remembrance view of the Mass as Jesus said when he first celebrated the last supper.  I told her I would be praying for her.

I had a good conversation with Delvon, a nice looking black guy with an afro, wearing sweats and sitting on the floor in front of the entrance to the art building tunnel.  After I had gone through the Gospel with him he said, “Well, you’ve opened the door. Let me think about this.”  I asked him to email me if he decided to pray.  He seemed interested, but I have said that to a lot of guys, promising to pray for them if they would.  But only one ever has.  I usually end up praying for them anyway if they seem on the cusp of giving their life to Christ.  So I’ll be praying for him, hoping Satan will not steal the seed.  Also, I got to go through the Gospel with Victoria and Mike, who Ellen and I pray for and I see often at school.  Victoria has a couple of Christian friends, so that gives me hope.

Thanks for your prayers for the ministry and for evangelism today if you had a chance.  It was a good day.

In Him,

Bob Bollow

To donate to our college ministry:
http://www.razoo.com/story/Third-Watch-Ministries-Nfp

Hey Sisters and Brothers in Christ,

Hope you are being blessed this weekend with the nearness of God.  We are finally de-christmas-decorating the living room. We’re a bit behind from doing other projects that seemed more taxing.  But hey if no one is coming over it doesn’t matter if Christmas is a bit longer.  So I chopped up the tree and burned it today and stowed the decorations in the garage attic.  Yesterday was a good day at school and I went through the Gospel with 8 people.  Best of all, Eric prayed to receive Christ.

Eric was the first guy I talked to.  He’s African American, had a couple inch afro, a bit of facial hair and a hoodie pulled up over his head with bright orange and red printing I couldn’t quite make out.  He was sitting with a friend, Isaac, who was not interested completely.  But he tuned in here and there and I left him with a booklet, as he was primarily on the phone and only barely eavesdropped.  But Eric tuned in and after I’d asked him some questions I asked him if he’d like to know how to get to Heaven.  He said he would, so I walked him through the Gospel.  He hadn’t gone to church consistently but went here and there.  He thought of himself as loyal and thought he would go to Heaven, “‘Cause I was always loyal to the people who were loyal to me.”  His answer brought to mind the verse in Luke 6:33 “And if you do good to those who do good to you, what credit is that to you? For even sinners do the same.” But after I explained that he could not earn his salvation and it was a gift of God through faith, he said he wanted to be forgiven and prayed to receive Christ.  Isaac, who knew his name was in the Bible but hadn’t known who the patriarch Isaac was, finally began to pay attention again.  I then gave him the booklet to look through as Eric prayed.  They both took Bible Studies from me and the book More Than A Carpenter to read.

So that was the best part of the day.  Thanks so much for your prayers for the ministry and for evangelism on Friday if you had a chance.  May you be blessed this weekend as you walk with Him.
Love in Christ,
Bob Bollow

To donate to our college ministry:
http://www.razoo.com/story/Third-Watch-Ministries-Nfp

Hey Sisters and Brothers in Christ,

Hope you had a great day walking with Jesus.  I parked my truck facing the sunshine and was grateful the cab was above freezing when I got back to it.  And Jade prayed to receive Christ on campus.  She is an African-American girl, cute kid, long wavy hair and pink boots that looked like UGGs.  She had on a black fleece and yoga pants with a Nike swoosh on the hip.

She was sitting on the second floor of the PE building doing pretty much nothing and didn’t really want to do a student survey.  It seemed like she was just being lazy though, so I asked her, “Do you know how to go to Heaven?”  She hesitated and so I asked, “Do you wanna answer just one question?”  She said ok so I told her my name and got hers and I asked her, “Say you are walking down the road and you get hit by a bus so your are dead. And you stand before God and He asks, ‘Why should I let you into heaven?’ What would you say?”  She thought for a second and said, “Because I deserve it.”  I explained, “That is not what the Bible says.  Do you want to know what it says?”  She said she did and I started talking her through the Gospel, telling her stories and stuff to help to illustrate it.  She had no idea how God took away her sins.  I talked about Jesus imputed righteousness to her, explaining it was like credit in a class given to give her an A, though she was getting a zero.  “So you don’t go to Heaven because you are good but because Jesus is good,” I explained.  I asked her if she would want to be forgiven for her sins and she said she did.  So I asked her if she believed Jesus was God and had died for her sins and rose from the dead.  She said yes, so I walked her through the prayer asking her if this was what she wanted and she said yes.  I said she could pray it in her head like I wasn’t there and I sat down where I had been kneeling next to her on the floor.  She turned to me and asked, “So I say it out loud?”  I said ” No, God can read your thoughts.  You can pray it in your head.”  So I watched as she prayed and she got a big smile on her face handing the booklet back to me.  I talked her through the work of the Holy Spirit ,giving her Gal. 5:22,23 to read, telling her she could keep the booklet.  I gave her a Bible study and explained some of it to her.  I got her email to send her more stuff.  She took More Than a Carpenter from me to read too, so that was good.  She goes to a church regularly.  She thanked me and I told her I would pray for her.

I had a couple other good conversations with students today, one who was searching for God.  Jon had a hard time believing. A self described Mexican, speaking of his family; “We are Mexicans and my mother is very religious.  She really loves God.”  He had done some drugs and had some strange spiritual experiences and felt God was telling him to stop.  I agreed and warned him about it, talking to him about things the Bible said about the spiritual world.  “This is blowing my mine right now,” he said.  He had been looking for a sign from God to give him faith.  I explained the Gospel to him and that faith was a gift from God and he should pray and ask for it.  He agreed to that and was going to begin reading the Bible.  I suggested that my finding and talking to him was probably the sign he was looking for and he seemed to agree to that.  He was very interested to learn the Gospel and I gave him The Case for A Creator.  We had a great talk.  I also went through the Gospel with Robin, a guy raised in a Unitarian background.  His family used the church for social reasons he said.  I gave him The Case for Christ and he seemed really interested to read it. Both seemed grateful to talk

So thanks for your prayers for the ministry and for Evangelism today if you had a chance.  God really blessed today.

In Him,

Bob
To donate to our college ministry:
http://www.razoo.com/story/Third-Watch-Ministries-Nfp

Hey Brothers and Sisters in Christ,

I hope your day went well walking with the Lord by His Spirit.  I had a good day on campus and 3 guys; Jorge, Remik and Conrad, each prayed to receive Christ as Savior.  Jorge was sitting in the hallway in the BIC building not up to much.  He was Latino, had a light growth of beard and brown hair, black pants and a Bulls Sweatshirt on.  Nice guy.  He went regularly to a Catholic church southwest of campus.  When I asked him why the God should let him into Heaven he said, “I have done no wrong.”  Then he hesitated and continued “Nothing major.  I’ve make mistakes.  Nothing too bad.”  But he still did not think he was very likely to go to Heaven.  He gave it 30%.  He explained that he had some friends who were Jehovah’s Witnesses and they had made him feel like they were better people than him.  I pointed out they did not believe Jesus was God and he nodded.  I went through the Gospel with him, explaining we don’t go to Heaven because we are good but because Jesus was good and by His merit we are saved.  He understood Jesus had died for him and said he wanted to be forgiven, trusting in that and prayed to receive Christ.  I was praying for him as we talked in the hope he would receive the forgiveness of God through Christ so the Holy Spirit would be in him to resist his self-righteous friends.  I gave him a Bible Study on the Deity of Christ where He claims to be God in the Bible, explaining that because Jesus is God, His blood is worth an infinite amount.  Because Jorge had a Bulls sweatshirt on I gave him a copy of Playing with Purpose that tells some of the testimonies of some of the great players in the NBA.  I got his e-mail and he said he would look forward to getting a Bible study emailed to him.

I went upstairs and as I walked past a busy lounge with some vending machines in it, I made eye contact with Remik, sitting at the end of a line of couch chairs.  He had a White Sox winter cap on and was chilling with two friends, one of whom was Conrad.  They jumped in a bit on the questionnaire and then trailed off to their own conversation but eves-dropped on the Gospel as I told stories to Remik.  Conrad had a beard.  Both he and Remik had brown hair and jeans on and I think they went to Church together, as later Remik had said he felt the presence of God at his Polish Language Church when an African Bishop spoke in English with a translator into Polish and Conrad acted like he had heard the speaker as well.  I explained that everyone has a relationship with God and can feel His presence because He is their creator, but not everyone is IN a relationship with God through Jesus and the Holy Spirit living in them.  This was after I had gone through the Gospel and a couple others fell into listening in, but all had left by the end.  I asked them if they wanted to be forgiven, asking Remik if he had ever asked God to forgive him truly trusting in Jesus work on the Cross.  He said, “No I don’t think I have ever done that,” and decided to pray to receive Jesus.  I’d asked Conrad his name, including him in one of the stories and so I asked him if he wanted to pray as well and he said he did.  I gave him the booklet and he prayed each phrase slowly, closing his eyes then looking again to read the next.  So that was great.  Neither wanted a book, saying they had no time to read, but I gave them each a Bible study.  I encouraged them to remember at Church that Jesus had died for them and be happy knowing they were forgiven.

So thanks for your prayers and for evangelism today if you had a chance.  God truly blessed.

In Him,
Bob Bollow

To donate to our college ministry:
http://www.razoo.com/story/Third-Watch-Ministries-Nfp

Hi bob,  Thank you for sending me more to read!  I also checked out the third watch website and I think it’s great what you’re doing for students like me.  I read the story about the wooden people and I thought it was a great example of what you explained to me about God and how we are the ones to allow Him into our lives and that He will be there, loving us, because He made us.  One day, I hope to have the confidence that Lulia has though.  I will try to come on Wednesday if I am not working. Thank you,  Jordin

Hey Brothers and Sisters in Christ,

Above is an email note I got from Jordin in response to a story and a Bible Study I sent her after she had prayed to receive Christ at College of DuPage.  You can hear the story I sent her here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=15QuHygLwFU

I don’t often hear back from students who pray with me.  I bump into many at school and chat them up.  But being an evangelist for our calling proves to have only a few we disciple and hang out with, though most are already going to church.  The real life of ministry we have practically has turned out to be much like Phillip the Evangelist in Acts 8.  In verse 39 it reads, “And when they came up out of the water, the Spirit of the Lord snatched Philip away; and the eunuch saw him no more, but went on his way rejoicing.”  The Holy Spirit leads me to many who would know Him, but I do not have the pleasure of teaching them much after going through the Gospel and explaining to them about the Holy Spirit’s work in their life thereafter.  I feel a bit snatched away at times, though nothing quite like the Star Trek experience Phillip had in Acts 8.  Since doing Evangelism for a while beginning in 2002, I have realized God would not be asking me to disciple the majority of those I preached to who received Christ.  And I could not.  But God, through His Holy Spirit, is able to keep them, having entered them if they have genuinely believed on Jesus’ work on the Cross to save them.  I explained the work of the Holy Spirit to one girl, Sabrina, this year that did not believe.  She said her problem with Christianity was the sacrifice of Christ for her sins.  She thought the details of Christ’s horrible sacrifice seemed like too
much to cover her meager infractions like “being unkind to her sister.”  I explained her real problem was ontological.  “Ontology is the study of being in Philosophy,” I told her.  “Your problem is your being does not match God’s being.  It’s like Heaven is water and you do not have the gills you need to exist there.  Christ’s sacrifice can cleanse you of all sin so God could enter into you and like is says in the book of Ezekiel ‘change your heart of stone for a heart of flesh’.  The crucifixion is horrible and covers horrible crimes.  But it happened that way because Jesus said He would fall into the hands of sinful men and they would do to Him whatever they wished. [Matt. 17:12, Luke 24:7]  Lambs were not tortured to cover sin in the sacrificial system and all that was necessary for Christ to do was to die, life for a life.”  I told her God could then enter her and make her able to breathe in Heaven.  I persuaded her to take the Student Edition of The Case for Christ to read in the hope she might turn and I pray for her.

Christianity is Being, Knowing and Doing.  All of these are part of the Christian life.  But all come from God and first, before anything else, there must be a change in Being.  Only the Holy Spirit can do this, and without Him an unbeliever will not be convicted of their sin and need for a savior [John 16:8].  Are you sometimes surprised or a bit shocked by the godless behavior of other people you read about or are talked about in media?  It is possible they do not think they have done anything wrong, but your own being is changed if He lives in you, so it is different. [1Cor. 6:10,11]  Then God can begin to transform our knowing [2Cor. 3:18, Eph. 1:17,18. 3:19].  Then our knowing begins to transform our doing and visa versa.  In the following verses you can see this process.  First God transforms their being, filling them then with Knowledge, which can only happen because the Holy Spirit can now fill a life cleansed by the Grace of Christ’s blood through faith.  This spiritual wisdom and understanding comes through Paul’s prayers for them, and so I also pray each night for those who have prayed to receive Christ.  Then having this knowledge they can do what pleases God, “walk in a manner worthy of the Lord”. Colossians 1:9&10 “For this reason also, since the day we heard of it, we have not ceased to pray for you and to ask that you may be filled with the knowledge of His will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding, so that you may walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, to please Him in all respects, bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God;”

Our piece of this is primarily to preach the Gospel, that God might change their being.  From there, through His power, we hope and pray they might be transformed to live the Christian life, guided by His Spirit if they have truly believed.  I talk to some through the year and there are people who attend Bible study each week at school.  I have gone through the Gospel with about 190 students this semester.  I often pray there would be more students at bible study, but I have to trust in God’s plan to preach the Gospel as Ellen and I don’t have the stamina to disciple so many.  We both continue to work part-time at other jobs to help provide for our needs and God works, as He will, in His good pleasure.

These are the students who have come to Christ this semester:

Berto, Jake, Kaichelle, Kayla,  Jose, Arielle, Dustin, Matt, Kiara, Jevante, Kiera, Rashundra, Lonie, Aleena, CJ, Burnelle, Lorn, Andrew, Daniella, Ana, Chelsea, Maria, Caitlan, Zam, Nettie, Courtney, Christian, Daniela, Kayla, Adriana, Ruby, Leesha, Paola, Cody*, Atche(H) , Sabrina, Sheridan, Mackenzie,  Dannielle, Jason, Dontate, Michael, Kialah, Ryan, Jordin, Phabian, Jeanna, Paul, Eden, Loni, Jake, Michael, Deonte, Zachary, Sandra, Angela, Alex, Sean, Allie*

We are grateful for another semester to serve the Lord with our ministry.  Thank you for your prayers and financial support.  May you be blessed this Christmas season.

Merry Christmas & Happy New Year!

email: bob.thirdwatch@sbcglobal.net

In Him,      Bob & Ellen                                                                                                      website:  www.thethirdwatch.org

                        To donate online to our college ministry:
http://www.razoo.com/story/Third-Watch-Ministries-Nfp

Hey Sisters and Brothers in Christ,

Well, I hope you were blessed today walking by the Spirit.  I had a good day on campus.  I  had some good conversations and Phabian prayed with me to receive Christ.  He’s an African American guy; thin, good looking, kind of crazy hair though.  His head was shaved on the sides and his afro kind of came up in waves like Jimmy neutron boy genius.  He had just a slight mustache.  Phabian was sitting in some chairs overlooking the revolving exit doors by the bookstore and said he’d be willing to answer some questions, except that he really had no answers.  When I asked him what he might say to God to get into Heaven he said, “I honestly have no idea.”  He didn’t have any certainty about if he would get to Heaven and hadn’t been to church in a while.  When his parents moved and he started College he lost the habit.  He literally said almost nothing as I went through the Gospel except a nod or a smile.  But when I asked him if he would want to be forgiven based on what Jesus had done for him on the Cross he said he did and prayed to receive Christ.  He had a bible at home so I encouraged him to read it.  I gave him More Than A Carpenter but he “never read much,” he said.  I also gave him a Bible study and explained the Christian life by living by the Spirit.  He gave me his email to get a bible study from me once in a while.  I told him I would be praying for him and he thanked me a couple times and I said, “God bless you.”  And he said, “You too.”  It wouldn’t be enough to give me hope; short conversations hearing the Gospel, and a simple prayer.  But if the Holy Spirit enters you by genuine faith when you pray, my hope for you is in the Power of God not the faithfulness of man.

So thanks for your prayers for me today doing evangelism if you had a chance and for the ministry.  God is leading me on campus.

In Him,

Bob Bollow

To donate to our college ministry:
http://www.razoo.com/story/Third-Watch-Ministries-Nfp

Hey Brothers and Sisters in Christ,

I hope you felt the presence of the Lord today as you walked with Him.  I had a good day on campus and Jordan and Ryan prayed to receive Christ today.

Ryan was sitting in the MAC Arts building and said he’d answer some questions.  He was from a Catholic background.  He was a nice lookin’ kid wearing a Bears sweatshirt and a stocking cap.  He had his arms crossed over his chest the entire time.  That is said to be a psychological sign of closure, but I think it is more about security or trust.  I read this week, “Millennials possess very low levels of trust in other people [19%]”.  I am careful not to demand follow-up information out of students.  Just because God has brought them to Himself doesn’t me they want to hang out with me.  Ryan was trusting in his works to save him, but was receptive to the Gospel and said he would want to be forgiven.  As I explained the difference between trusting in Christ and in his own works and asked him if he understood it and would want to be forgiven he said, “Probably” But then he was quiet and prayed the prayer as I held it out and said, “Ok.”  I explained the Holy Spirit to him and how the Christian life was to be changed from the inside by God’s power.  I encouraged him to think about that during the Lord’s supper, that he was forgiven and he said, “Yeah but if you have committed a mortal sin you are even more guilty to take it.”  I agreed and said there was a Bible verse that said as much about how taking it unrepentantly would make you guilty of the body and blood of the Lord. [1Cor. 11:27].  I talked to him about forgiveness and that it was only God who could forgive our sin.  I gave him Playing With Purpose on the NBA and a Bible study to read.  As I left him saying, “Good to talk with ya.” he said, “Nice to meet you.”

Jordan was sitting at the hallway entrance to the tunnel that goes over to the PE building.  She had highlights in her hair and was really nice, cute oval face, skinny jeans looked acid washed.  She said the thing she wanted to do before she died was, “To fall madly in love and marry that person.”  She grew up Catholic, but when her parents divorced (probably why she hoped for love), she started to go to an evangelical church for awhile.  But she was working and going to school full time and about to start another job and had no time for church right now.  We talked about other religions and I explained that Christianity was the only religion offering any assurance of Heaven to you.  Hinduism was escape from the endless cycle of births and deaths into nothingness.  Buddhism was similar.  There was no assurance in Islam.  Judaism was really about good works as in the Old Testament you went to Sheol not Heaven.  It was a place of rest but not the presence of God or a reward.  I went through the Gospel with her and asked her, “So the question is:  What kind of person are you or would you want to be?  Would you want to be forgiven for your sins and have God live inside you or is God more on the outside of your life?”  And she began to cry.  I said that was ok when she was kind of apologetic and said she didn’t have to know why, “Oh I know why”, she said and got teary eyed again, “It’s signs [from God].”  I nodded.  She wanted to pray to receive Christ and did.  I gave her More Than a Carpenter to read and a Bible study and got her email to send her stuff.  As I left, her friend had shown up and sat down so I leaned over and whispered, “God loves you.”  And told her she’d be in my prayers through the year.
So thanks for your prayers for the ministry and for evangelism today if you had a chance.  God worked and moved peeps to Himself.

In Him,
Bob Bollow

To donate to our college ministry:
http://www.razoo.com/story/Third-Watch-Ministries-Nfp

Hey Sisters and Brothers in Christ,

Hope your day was filled with all good things from the Father of Lights.  I had a good day on campus and Dontate [Dante] and Kialah [Kī lä] both prayed to receive Christ.  Dontate was sitting on a bench by a classroom doorway on the first floor of the science building.  He was reading the bulletin board and said he’d answer some questions.  We talked a long time. He was an African American guy, had a black Nike stocking cap on and a black warm-up jacket and was wearing some really worn out cross trainer shoes that looked like they’d seen a couple winters and skinny jeans.  He had big sideburns that were patchy and pronounced features, looked 22 maybe.  He had some of his own ideas about where you went when you died.  It seemed like he thought you went into some kind of greater consciousness, like something Oprah might push.  We talked about the claims of different religions and the impossibility of knowing the “good” thing to do without God, who was all powerful and all knowing guiding the outcome of your actions.  He asked what the purpose of life was and I explained the Gospel and that God wanted to live inside him and do good things through him.  I told him the Scriptures teach that, “All things worked together for good for those who loved God and are called according to His purposes”.  I explained the Bible suggests the fingers of God on earth are men and we are created for good works in Christ that He has prepared beforehand that we might walk in them [Eph. 2:10 ].  “It’s like God wrote you the perfect play for your life,” I told him.  “But you are not graded on how well you say the lines or make your entrances on stage but on how often you ask for guidance right in the middle of the play from God [the Director].  I asked him if he wanted to be forgiven and he said he did.  I asked if he believed Jesus is God and died for his sins and if he trusted in that and he said he did.  So I showed him a prayer he could pray to receive Christ and he prayed with me silently.  I explained the fruit of the Spirit providing the strength to live the Christian life.  I showed him a bunch of books and he decided he’d like to read the Case for Christ.  He had a lot of questions and wanted the video I had that answered apologetic questions so I gave him that also.  He gave me his email to send him stuff too. So that was great.

Kialah, a cute kind of pretty girl black girl, her hair tinted light brown, had a light cream colored linen shirt with a dark camisole under it and a 2 and a half inch think rhinestone head band, jeans on.  She was a nice kid who went to an apostolic church and was sitting with Kyree, good looking (also black) guy with youngish facial hair and a hoodie pulled up over his head.  She’d shot Kyree down before [romantically] in the past it turned out, so I played with them about that.  He did not want to answer any questions but it turned out he had some and felt really distant from God.  He asked me what to do about it and I said to pray for more faith because it was a gift he could ask for more of and to ask God to draw closer to him.  I told him I would pray for him.  He played basketball and I gave him a copy of Playing with Purpose (on believers who play in the NBA) and a Bible study, after he’d he listened to the Gospel as I explained it to Kialah.  I had explained imputation to them, telling them you don’t go to Heaven because you are good but because Jesus was good and His righteousness is to our credit.  I used several examples, finally saying if you get adopted by a billionaire you get to live in the mansion and drive all the expensive cars and if you are adopted into God’s family you get the blessings of it.  The righteousness of Jesus is what you get so you are fit for Heaven.  They both said that made sense.  Kialah had thought awhile {when I’d first sat down and asked} about why God should let her into Heaven and finally landed on, “Because I serve Him.”  That’s obviously the answer given by the people to whom Christ responds, “I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.”  I told her the story, after going through the Gospel with them, and said she’d have the same problem.  I asked her if she wanted to be forgiven and she said yes.  So I asked her if, when she prayed for forgiveness, is she thinking she was a good person who served God and God was a good God and would forgive her or, “was she trusting that God would forgive her because Jesus had died for her?”  “I’m about half way there,” she said with a smile.  “You wanna land?” I asked.  She said she did and so I showed her a prayer to receive God’s forgiveness and she prayed quietly to receive Christ, smiling first to tell us not to watch.  I explained the work of the Holy Spirit to live the Christian life to her and she said she’d email me for more stuff.

I had a good conversation with an atheist, Michael, who took The Case for a Creator to read.  Nice kid, baseball player.  I’d talked to his brother John a couple years ago it turned out.  He thought there was no evidence, but of course there is a great deal of it so I am hopeful and will be praying for him this next year.  I felt like we had a connection talking about guitar playing and Tommy Emanuel, a guitarist we both liked that we’d seen live [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vI8p8mYP_5A {this is him on youtube}]  We owned the same brand of acoustic guitar. (Though his is worth 3 times what mine is and he seems to play it 10 times better than me.)

So thanks for your prayers for the ministry and for evangelism today if you had a chance.  God really blessed.

In Him,

Bob Bollow

To donate to our college ministry:
http://www.razoo.com/story/Third-Watch-Ministries-Nfp

Hey Brothers and Sisters in Christ,

I hope ya had a good day walkin’ with the Lord Jesus.  I keep looking for the peeps and towards the end of the day came upon Jason who prayed to receive Christ.  He was sitting in a first floor lounge in the BIC building when we began to talk.  He had sandy hair and a warm-up jacket on, good looking kid.  At first blush it seemed like Jason had trusted Christ.  When I asked him why God would let him into Heaven he talked about how he liked to worship God and did so a couple times each week at church.  But this is still just a religious work.  He had no assurance of his salvation, but said it was just “believing you’d go” [to Heaven] but it seemed not in the work of Christ to provide for him.  He acknowledged Christ had died when I mentioned this but it didn’t seem essential.  So I asked him where he went to church and he said, “Church of Christ.’  The Chicago Church of Christ around Chicago is not to be confused with the denomination you see as you head south of here, but is a division of the Boston Church of Christ. I t is really something of a low-grade cult.  They preach that you are saved by your works, your baptism (saying you cannot be saved if you are not baptized) and also Christ’s work on the Cross.  But I have yet to meet a Church of Christ kid who mentioned the last of the three.  Still, I went through the Gospel with Jason, and he said he would want to be forgiven.  So trying to help him think about it I said as I often have with religious nominal Christians who are not saved, “When you are praying for forgiveness, are you thinking you will be forgiven because Christ has died for you or because you are good and go to Church?”  His reply was, “I never thought about it before.”  Which did not surprise me given the teaching of the Church he was in, so I explained further how this was what he lacked and he decided to pray to receive Christ.  I had explained that he did not go to Heaven because he was good but because Jesus was good.  And I reinforced this with him, talking him through the work of the Holy Spirit.  I explained he needed to ask the Holy Spirit to fill him in worship and that that was what pleased God (that he worshiped in the Spirit).  I left him with a Bible Study and the book Playing with Purpose about the Christian players in the NBA.  So hopefully he’ll be encouraged by the stories in it and the way those guys are living for Christ.  Please pray the truth of the Gospel penetrates his heart and God, through His Holy Spirit, leads him to a better church.

So thanks for your prayers for the ministry and for Evangelism today if you had a chance.  God was active by His Spirit and blessed.

in Him,

Bob Bollow

To donate to our college ministry:
http://www.razoo.com/story/Third-Watch-Ministries-Nfp

Hey Brothers and Sisters in Christ,

We have had a great year thus far doing evangelism, though we wish we had more students coming to the Bible study on Wednesday nights.  I thought I would take a story from this past week and fill in all the gaps from what I had already written in the emails some of you receive, knowing most people only get to read a handful of them in the course of a semester.  So here is the story of Mackenzie coming to Christ on a Thursday.

When I first got to campus I had a bit of a cold coming on that I was beating back with vitamins, so I thought I’d wear my coat in from the truck.  It was near 50 degrees outside and I would usually throw my coat in the truck and dash for it (and save the 50 cents it costs to use a locker.)  Thanks to my Swedish mother’s gene pool I never got fat, but the skinny chill easily.  So I turned in to park at a different door, thinking I hadn’t walked that part of campus as much and there were lockers by it.  But no parking spaces were open.  Not a single one in two different lots.  So I felt like I was just wasting time and went to where I usually park.  The reason I am telling you this is because this entrance sent me straight down a hallway from the lockers toward the bookstore and Mackenzie was the first person I talked to about Christ.  At first she was a bit behind me down the hall.  Then I felt provoked to double-back to ask someone I had passed, an Indian girl who said ‘no thank you.’  By then Mackenzie is in front of me by 15 yards and sits on the bottom steps in front of the bookstore entrance.  Had I not been prompted to talk to the girl who turned down conversation, Mackenzie would have sat down behind me and I would have never spoken to her, having already gone up the steps.

It turns out Mackenzie (a very pretty blonde girl) was engaged to be married.  She had been sitting on the steps for no more than 15 seconds when I began to talk to her.  I asked her if she wanted to do a student survey about God for a Bible study group.  (Answer some questions about God, basically.  I don’t use the word “survey” in what we post as it is really a “questionnaire”  Rules prohibit surveys and data collecting on campus i.e. What toothpaste do you use? stuff.)  She said she was waiting for someone.  “But I’m a Christian so I would,” she said.  So I asked, “Well, ya wanna answer one big question?”  She agreed a bit reluctantly and I said, “You’re walking down the road and you get hit by a bus.  So you’re dead, and you stand before God and He says ‘Why should I let you into heaven?’  What would you say?”  Her response sounded like the stereotypical section of Today’s Christian Woman magazine, but it had nothing of the Gospel in it, just love and good works.  So I said, “That’s all great, but that’s not what the Bible says.  Would you like to know what it says?”  She said she would so I continued.  “Christianity is like a blood transfusion.  I have A+ blood so if you got A+ blood and give me a blood transfusion I’m great.  But if you got B- blood, I’m dead.  So God wants to transfuse His life into you, to live inside you with His Holy Spirit.  But to do that He has to take away your sin.  Make you His type.  Then you are all perfect and holy inside and you match God and He can move right in.  So do you know what God does with Jesus to take away your sin?”  “I don’t think they have ever talked about that at my Church.” she answered.

I explained that Jesus had died in her place for the perfect life she had not lived.  “Because you are supposed to live a perfect life.  The Bible says you are to be perfect as your Heavenly Father is perfect” [Matt. 5:48].  So really if you stood before God, He’d be like, ‘Mackenzie, welcome to Heaven.  You were supposed to live a perfect life.  Did you live a perfect life?  Where’s my perfect life?’  And you’d be like ‘I didn’t live a perfect life’.  So God could say, ‘Well everything here is perfect, I’m perfect and this is a perfect place.  You don’t fit in here.  You gotta go to Hell.’  But that’s crazy right?  Then everyone goes to Hell because no one has lived a perfect life.  So the solution is:  God becomes a man, Jesus, and He lives a perfect life for you [1Cor. 1:30].  And the merit, or the credit, of His life is stored up.  Then He walks around telling people the truth and they get angry at Him and they kill him.  So now he’s dead.  But Jesus wants to die because the Bible says without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sins [Heb. 9:22].  And that does several things.  You know how, when you are a little kid and someone does something really cruel to you, it kills you a little bit?”  She nodded.  “Well, when we sin we create death in the world and Jesus is the source of all life, since He’s God and life is in the blood [Lev. 17:11].  So when He sheds His blood He gives His life to the world [John 6:33] and restores life to all the places we made death.  And He dies in your place [1Pet. 3:18] since you were under the penalty of death for not living a perfect life.  And then you know how when someone dies you inherit their stuff?  Like if you got an uncle or something you might get his car?”  She nodded.  “Well, when Jesus dies you inherit the credit from His perfect life.  It’s like say you were taking a class here, and everybody is failing, the teacher’s horrible, and people are dropping.  So there’s only like10 people left in the class and you think you should drop too since you got a Zero.  Literally nothing she says in class is on the quizzes.  But then you hear about one guy, Billy, who has a 100% in the class.  So you figure you’ll talk to him first.  Maybe he’s got a website he’s using or something.  So you go to him and you say, ‘Hey I hear you got 100% in the class.  How come?’  He says, ‘Oh, I took this class last year at U of I.  They changed the course description on me so they won’t let me transfer the credit but she’s using the same textbook and I think it might even be the same quizzes ‘cause I seem to know the answers.  And since they won’t give me credit for my other class, I’ve been turning in all my old projects and I got a 1000 points of extra credit.  Teacher thinks I’m totally geeking on this class, but the truth is I had it last semester.’  So you are like, ‘Oh that won’t help me,’ and he’s like ‘no.’  So he goes for a ride in his car on the weekend and gets wiped out by a truck, he’s dead.  The teacher comes to class on Monday and says, ‘I have terrible news.  Billy has died.  He had a 1000 points of extra credit and I don’t want all that to go to waste.  So I’m gonna give it to you guys.’  You look around and there’s only 10 people left in the class and you think, Well, I’m sorry about Billy but I just got 100%.  That’s what Jesus did.  The credit of his life is to your credit.  In God’s eyes you get 100%.  So you don’t go to Heaven because you are good, you go to Heaven because Jesus was good.”  Then I quoted the beginning of Rom. 13:14 to her.  “How do I get Jesus to do that [for me]?” she asked.  I said, “That’s the perfect question.”  I explained she need only ask Him to, and walked her through the prayer and asked her if she would like to pray to receive Christ, reading her John 1:12 and explaining it.  She said “yes” and prayed.

I explained the work and fruit of the Holy Spirit to her as quickly as I could, giving her Galatians 5:22,23.   I explained that faith saved her and not her works.  As I went into a story about a lousy boyfriend who was a thief, a whore and a drug addict, she stopped me and said, “That’s like my fiancé.  He was arrested last night for felony theft of $1,000 in stuff.”  I looked in her eyes and said, “You need to break up with him.”  And she said, “I know.  I think God is speaking to me through you right now.  I don’t want to sound strange, but I think God led you to me.”   I agreed with her, given that she had prayed to receive Christ.  She talked some of her addiction problems saying she had been sober for 18 months.  “I am a good Christian woman {now}.  But I have to go,” she said.  “My mom is texting me [her ride] asking where I am.”  She showed me the text “I’m in front where are you?”

I encouraged her as much as I could briefly, and gave her a Bible study on the ways Jesus claims to be God and the book,  Enjoying Your Walk With God: How to Live Above Your Everyday Circumstances.  Just as I left her I said, “I don’t know if I will see you again, but I can pray for you.  Spell your name for me Mackenzie.”  She spelled her full name for me and I wrote it down and I said to her, “Leave that guy.”  “I will,” she said and ran to the doors.

Mackenzie is just one of 39 students who have prayed to receive Christ this semester through mostly one on one encounters.  Here are their names:

Berto, Jake, Kaichelle, Kayla, Jose, Arielle, Dustin, Matt, Kiara, Jevante, Kiera, Rashundra, Lonie, Aleena, CJ, Burnelle, Lorn, Andrew, Daniella , Ana, Chelsea, Maria, Caitlan, Zam, Nettie, Courtney, Christian, Daniela, Kayla, Adriana, Ruby,  Leesha, Paola, Cody, Atche, Sabrina, Sheridan, Mackenzie, Dannielle

Thank you for your prayers and financial support.  They make bringing the Gospel to college students possible.

In Him,

Bob & Ellen

To donate online to our college ministry:
http://www.razoo.com/story/Third-Watch-Ministries-Nfp