Results of the Work – 4/17/19

Hey Sisters and Brothers in Christ,

I hope your day was blessed and you had joy walking with the Lord. I had a good day on campus finding out Erik who had said he would pray later on March 4th had prayed to receive Jesus. I wrote in March, “Erik committed to Christ saying he would pray later. He promised and offered to pinky swear that he’d pray, so we did.” So he was good as his word. I had given him a Bible Promises book and he shared the booklet with his mom. I told him I would put him on my everyday prayer list and he was glad for that. When we talked before he said we had spoken a few times before that and he said it again today but he had seen the booklet for the first time on the 4th so I know I had not gone through the gospel with him until then. When kids turn me down I sometimes engage them about something else, the Cubs or something involving their hat or their t-shirt. But finding him finally willing to talk paid off. He had forgotten my name today but I’d remembered his having been praying for him. His mom is an evangelical from South America. He was grateful.

I went through the Gospel with Brandon who seemed familiar with it and seemed like he was Eastern European in accent. He’d been raised for a while with religious grandparents but now lived with his parents who were atheists  When I asked him what he would say to God to get into Heaven he said, “I would say… gimme a sec.” Then after a few moments he said, “Because when I know the truth, if I know there’s a Heaven and I know there’s a God I will do my best to be a faithful Christian.” After I went through the Gospel with him, which he seemed somewhat familiar with knowing Jesus had died he said, “Right now I’m on the outside trying to find a reason.” So I showed him the student edition of The Case for Christ and I explained Strobel’s background and credentials to find the evidence and said, “Seems like there’s some reasons to believe in here.” He gratefully took the book. He was a heavy set guy as was Erik who had short hair to Brandon’s mop, (and Erik looks Latino) both wore sweats but Brandon’s beard came in sparely and he’d tried to make it long to compensate and wore glasses.

Finally I went through the Gospel with a pretty girl, Grace, who was lying on the concrete cap of the low stone wall on the end of the pond behind the MAC Arts building. She had long brown hair and was dressed in skinny jeans and tennis shoes with a black button down the front sweater and a jacket she had zipped open. She thought about getting into Heaven, “I always thought about my actions and how they would impact the greater good.” She thought she might not have a chance at Heaven with the God of the Old Testament who seemed merit based but possibly the God of the New Testament who looked at your motives. She thought Jesus was a new kind of Rabbi based on that. I said that Jesus had said about divorce when they asked Him if they could just get rid of their wives that, no they had to say married and could not be cruel to their wives. They complained Moses had told them they could give their wives a certificate of divorce and get rid of her. Jesus answered that Moses had written that because of the hardness of their hearts. So a lot of the harshness of the Old Testament was because God was dealing with a hard hearted people. But Isaiah said God would take out their heart of stone and give them a heart of flesh and then write His law on there hearts. She nodded at that. But to do that God has to be inside you. And I explained how God wanted to live inside her. I told her that I thought that the God of the Old Testament and the New were there same God and said, “You know how Jesus walks on the water?” She’d heard the story. “Well he walks up to them and even though the first thing he says is “It is I”, they still thought he was a ghost and freaked out. It’s kind of like a comedy sketch.” She smiled at that. “Then the one guy tries to walk out to him and he sinks and Jesus says, ‘Why did you doubt?’ and he floats him puts him back in the boat. He’s soaking wet the rest are freaking out so he just makes the boat go right to shore like a motor boat, to get it over with, but it’s really like a miracle to make people look stupid. But if you look in the Old Testament…” I reached into my bag and got out the Bible study to show her the verse, “Job writes describing God, ‘Who alone stretches out the Heaven, and marches on the waves of the sea.’ [Job 9:8] So Jesus comes to them at night waling on the sea, to tell them He is the God of the Old Testament.” I went through the Gospel with her and when I asked her if the prayer I read at the end was the desire of her heart she said, “Sometimes it is.” So I said maybe she will want that and explained living inside out. She was a sweet kid. I wished her Happy Easter and she said she’d be celebrating Passover. “Blessings on your Passover,” I said. She had zipped up her black hooded coat to go inside. I said it was nice to meet her and then having walked a few steps I turned and called her name and she stopped And I said, “Would you like this Bible study?” She said she would and took it. So I will be praying she will know her God is her savior.

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

In Him,

Bob