Hey sisters and Brothers in Christ,

I hope your day was blessed walking with the Lord. We had a good day at the book table. We had about 8 peeps interested in coming to a Bible Study and two students, Lisa and Phillip, each prayed to receive Christ.

Lisa walked up and said she might be interested in going to a Bible Study. She went to a Vineyard Church that is not too far away. I asked her what she would say to God if she died and He asked her why He should let her into Heaven. “What?” she asked. So I repeated the question and she began to talk about doing religious things that seemed good. She mentioned reading the Bible among them.  She also said that she struggled sometimes to be faithful in all of it. She has sandy reddish-blonde hair pulled back and braces, very slight build. “What is it that happened to you though that allowed God to let you into Heaven?” She seemed a bit lost, so I asked her if she wanted to hear some Bible verses. She knew Jesus had died to take away her sins as I questioned her more. I finished talking her through the Gospel and talking about the power of God inside her by the Spirit to be faithful in the Christian life. I offered her the option of being forgiven with Christ inside and she said she wanted to be forgiven. So I said, “Well I know you knew the story of Jesus before, but it seems like you had not been trusting in Him but instead trying to do good things to be forgiven and be accepted by God.” She said that was true and so I offered her a prayer she could pray to trust in Christ. She prayed silently and was really happy. I explained more how she could ask for God’s transforming power and that Christianity was living “inside out” where God transformed her on the inside and gave her power to live the Christian life. “Like say you go to church and they say, ‘You should do this and you should do that’ and you think, ‘This is great but I’m going to forget this by Wednesday.’ But, if you wanted to, in that moment you can pray to God and say. ‘Lord make me this kind of person.’ Then if you have forgotten by Wednesday, it does not matter because God began to work on Sunday when you prayed for Him to transform you.” She liked that idea. I explained the fruit of the Spirit to her and gave her Gal. 5:22&23, saying she could pray for any of what was listed there and God would give her more joy and peace by asking, or faith if she had doubts because faith is a gift. I showed her that verse again. I gave her the booklet with some of the verses I mentioned and the book 20 Things God Can’t Do, writing her name and the date she’d trusted Christ in the front. She gave me her email and I gave her a Bible study and she happily walked off.

Phillip had drifted by earlier and left his contact information. I could not talk to him then as I was talking with Jacob, who was a theist.  We’d been talking a long time about some of the absurdities of the materialistic view and political correctness in gender issues. Jacob took Darwin’s Black Box to read and The Case for Christ, so I hope those will bring some fruit. Phillip wandered by again as we were packing up. He was tough to miss as he had a black t-shirt on with bright lettering that said, “I ALSO BELIEVE IN UNICORNS” He had a back-pack on and was wearing a fedora 1950’s style had some brown curly hair poking out and has gotten some face painting done at one of the other tables. He looked pretty trippy, frankly. I thought he might be an atheist.  Since he had given us contact info I wanted to know more about him, so I asked if he really did believe in Unicorns and he said he thought it was possible. I agreed. He was wearing a pretty big cross around his neck and it turned out he considered himself spiritual and had gone through Catholic education his entire life. I also asked him the “Big philosophical question” about death and what he would say to God. He said he wouldn’t really know what to say. He thought about it more, and so I asked him what he thought it was that got him into Heaven. He listed some things including reconciliation, but it seemed he had not thought about what that meant. I asked him what the big thing was that Jesus did that took away his sins and he listed some religious works, so I continued to go through the Gospel with him and he was really interested. I asked him, as I completed the explanation I had given him (a bit abbreviated as the room was packing up and I did not want to lose him) with all the Bible verses, if he wanted to be forgiven. He said, “I would want to have God live inside me and be forgiven.” He had not put it all together either. I said, “Well, I think you knew the story of Jesus. But were trusting in religious works to make you right with God and get you into Heaven?” He agreed, so I offered him a prayer where he could trust in Jesus work by faith. He decided to pray and did quietly was I waited. I gave him 20 Things God Can’t Do and wrote his name and the date in the front. I explained a symbolic view of the mass to him, as he said he went to church every Sunday, and I explained responding to the message as I had with Lisa, praying for God to work inside him.

So thanks for your prayers for our college ministry and for the book table conversations today God truly blessed.

In Him,

Bob