Hey Sisters and Brothers in Christ,

I hope your day was blessed with all good things. I had a good day on campus and got to disciple a couple Christian students a bit on the fly as it were who had not understood their faith in certain ways. And Austin and Kevin each prayed with me to receive Christ.

Austin was sitting in the upstairs lounge of the PE building. He was wearing a red long sleeve collarless shirt that buttoned at the neck, and blue jeans cuffed at the bottom over white tennis shoes. He wore glasses and looked like a character in a cartoon that I could not place, a bit like the kid in American Dad minus the cleft chin (the show is twisted though I don’t recommend anyone watch it). His head was small he had a slight build, his brown hair swept back. He wore glasses round half circle with the top of the frames arched up. Nice guy, seemed meek. He described himself as cautious anxious and disciplined. When I asked him what he would say to God if asked why He should let him into Heaven he said, “I don’t know, kinda be His choice. I don’t think I’ve done anything wrong to someone where they would hate me.” He listened to the Gospel and when I asked him what Jesus had done to take away his sins he said, “He was crucified.” He thought he had a 50/50 change to going to Heaven and had to gone to church when he was young. He did not have a lot to say and after I had gone through the Gospel with him he said he would want to be forgiven. I asked him if he believed Jesus was God had died for his sins and rose from the dead and he said, “Yeah, that is what I’ve always been told.” I said that if he would want to trust in that to be forgiven, there was a prayer he could pray. He was so low key that I prayed silently he would not want to pray but would want to think about it if he was not truly believing. But after I went through the prayer with him and asked if it was the desire of his heart he said, “Yeah.” And he prayed to receive Jesus. I explained to him that if he would now trust in the righteousness of Jesus to be his righteousness,  the likelihood he would go to Heaven was 100%. I offered him several books but he said, “To be honest I know I would not read them.” So I chatted him up about God giving him the power to do everything He was asking him to do, living “Inside Out”. Then I asked him some questions about his life at school and we parted. So I will be praying the Gospel truly takes root in his life and the prayer he prayed will become ever more meaningful to him and God will continue to draw him to himself.

I walked down the stairs from there and 3 black guys were hanging out over by the counter in front of the vending machines. I asked them if they wanted to do a student survey and the one guy suddenly had to go. Another guy said he was an atheist but the other, Kevin, said he went to church and walked away from me 5 steps to the vending machines, the counter now between us. He began to try to buy something to eat out of the machine, (he finally got some gummy bears).  So I asked him if he wanted to answer the big question about how you went to heaven. The atheist, who was largely occupied on his phone, started to razz Kevin and started even to film him on his phone saying, “Yeah answer the question,” as Kevin stood at the machine.  Kevin stood with his back to me the atheist in a chair between some machines facing me. Kevin said, “OK what’s the question.” “So you are walking down the road and you get hit by a bus and your dead and you stand before God and He says, ‘Why should I let you into Heaven?’ What would you say?” He asked me to repeat it and I’d said it too fast. The atheist then lost interest and stopped filming. Kevin had blue sweats on with a big white stripe down the sides, a grey “Champion” sweat shirt. He had a short Afro, a beard and mustache, a wider nose, dark skinned, tanned from the summer. He was about my height, a touch bigger in size. He came back to where I was leaning on the counter where he’d left his stuff and said, “Because I praise Him.” I said that the Bible said something different and asked if he’d like to know what the Bible said about how he went to Heaven and he said, “OK.” I’d kind of cornered him but he tuned right into what I was telling him of the Gospel, completely focused. He knew Jesus had died for sins and listened to my telling him of His imputed righteousness and the blood that cleansed him. I said he needed to trust in Christ by faith to be forgiven believing he was God had died for his sins and rose from the dead and asked if he would want to be forgiven or thought something else–showing him the two circles one with Christ inside one with Him outside. “I pick that one,” he said, pointing at the circle with Christ on the throne of your life. I said that he could be forgiven telling God he was trusting in Christ and walked him through the prayer to receive Jesus. “I actually like that, that’s a good one,” he said of the prayer. I said he could pray it silently and be forgiven and God would live inside him and give him strength to live the Christian life. “Wanna do it?” I asked. “Yeah,” he replied and he prayed to receive Jesus. He did not have his own Bible but said, “I was gonna get one,”  I gave him one showing him the “Where to Turn” section. “This is a nice Bible,” he said as I show him that the messianic passages and the words of Jesus in read. I wrote his name and the date and “forgiven” in the front. I explained the Christian life, the fruit of the Spirit and gave him 20 Things God Can’t Do writing “Just Ask” and “By the Spirit’s Power” in the front. I gave him a Bible study on the deity of Christ. I took out the survey and said I wanted to write down some of what he had said and what he looked like so I could tell people what he looked like and ask people to pray for him, I checked with him writing what he’d said.  I said would pray for him every night until spring and for one year thereafter. I said I’d not asked him the question what the likelihood was he would go to Heaven. But now it was 100% because now he was trusting in the righteousness of Jesus to be his righteousness. “And how righteous was Jesus?” I asked. “100%” he said. And I said there was enough righteousness for both of us. “Thanks for talkin’ with me, I know I gave you some trouble,” I said. “It’s cool. Thank you. I needed it,” he replied. “OK,” I said and I headed out.

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

In Him,

Bob