Hey Friends in Christ,

I hope your day yesterday was good and blessed I’m a bit late with this. Marcus prayed with me to receive Christ though it took a while to help him understand he was not trusting in Christ for salvation. He was a good looking guy who went to Willow Creek, sharp square features looked Latino had on a hoodie and jeans, he was sitting at one of the bar height tables overlooking the MAC arts lounge. When I asked him what he would say to God if asked why He should let him into Heaven he said, “There’s not really a reason. I’ve made some decisions that are not representative of You and what I’m supposed to stand for as a Christian. But I do believe he is a God of mercy and grace… but I’m not counting on it. It’s all up to Him and His time.” So I began to go through the Gospel with him saying God had to take away his sin to live inside him. When I asked him what the big thing was that God had done to take away his sin he thought for a bit. “Adam and Eve?” he guessed. “Well, God does it with Jesus,” I replied and began to go through the Gospel on the page with a cross on it saying, “God sees you can’t come up to Him because of your sin, so he comes down and becomes a man, Jesus, and he lives a perfect life.” He then said some thing about remembering in a “What was I thinking” kind of way. I thought, fine he had a moment he’d forgotten, I can provide some assurance. Some students who don’t seem to be trusting in Christ later say they were and I can’t see their heart so I accept it. And he agreed with everything I said of the death and resurrection of Christ and His imputed righteousness as if to say Yeah isn’t that great that’s what I mean, yet he had not know what I told him based on my interaction with him as we spoke. He said he would want to be forgiven for his sins so I asked if he had truly been trusting in Christ, since everything he had said he’d thought contradicted what I’d said of the Gospel. He insisted he had been trusting in Christ at one point saying happily, “I was baptized for this, I took communion for this.” That sounded a bit Roman Catholic, though he went to Willow Creek, possibly he’d been raised catholic. I said that was not what I was asking him and explained a bit more. Finally I said, “OK fine well then this is a way you could share your faith,” and I flipped through the pages of the booklet with a half sentence summarizing each one. “And if someone said they wanted to be forgiven trusting in Christ there is a prayer they could pray,” and I walked him through it. “Possibly this is a prayer you could pray telling God what you are now truly trusting in?” I suggested. “Yeah I’ll pray that tonight when I pray,” he replied. I hoped he would as I was reasonably sure he had not trusted in Christ before. I really couldn’t see from what he had said that he had. I explained living “inside out” by the Spirit. He’d thought he knew of the fruit of the Spirit when I explained that. “So if someone were to ask you now why God should let you into Heaven what would you say?” (I had already said the answer to this exact question 4 minutes earlier.) “That I am trusting in God.” “Well, yes but specifically that you are trusting that Jesus died for you.” I think he said “Oh yeah right” or words to that effect. “How would you feel about asking God to forgive you right now? You could pray silently in your heart like I wasn’t even here.” He wanted to do that and he did. He seemed like something had lifted, visibly relieved. I gave Him the Book Bible Promises for You. And encouraged him to pray the Bible verses in it for anything he needed. He had a Bible. He was happy and I said Merry Christmas and he said Merry Christmas and I was off. So I will be praying the Eyes of his heart may be enlightened and is filled up with the knowledge of God.

So thanks for your prayers for the ministry and for evangelism Thursday if you had a chance, God truly blessed.

In Him,

Bob