Hey Sisters and Brothers in Christ,

I hope your weekend is being blessed by the presence of God and you are in a warm dry place. I had a good day on campus Friday reconnecting with some students I had not seen in a while and Ian Prayed with me to receive Christ. Clare a girl with long, mostly blonde hair and wire glasses, with an in your face kind of way about her saying she could be annoying and a water polo sweatshirt on said she would pray later. We talked in the Cafeteria. I gave her a Bible Promises book she liked. She’d been in 3 different Roman Catholic schools for 12 years of her life. It took some skills to talk to her but I think she believed Jesus had died for her when I asked and she thought about it for a bit so I said she could then place her trust in that and know she was forgiven. Maybe I’ll run into her again and see if the seed sprouted.

Ian was sitting up on the third floor of the BIC in a lounge with some vending machines toward the Southeast side of the building. I’d been prompted to go up there when I first got to school. He had a pull over, heavier button neck shirt on and jeans. He had sandy, darker hair and wire rimmed glasses, just looked like the classic regular guy face in a crowd. Like Matt Damen’s cousin or something akin to that.  I asked him if he wanted to answer some questions about God and got his name and he began to talk saying, “I’ve put a lot of thought into this over time [when he got older]. My parents and all my siblings have gone to church through the years and when you are young you just go through the motions.” He said he had thought about his family’s beliefs and thought, “I believe in God and that Jesus died for our sins. For me the hardest part is our daily lives, to make it part of your daily life. Over all I believe in God, I think it is important you can talk to someone about it.” He had gone with his family to a big Church in a former office building on the highway on the northern most edge of Naperville but they had then switched to the Compass Church finding the pastor more relatable. I said I had met the pastor there and knew his brother a bit. I asked him what he would say to God to get into Heaven and he said, “I was not a truly bad person, but I’m not probably up to the standard He’d want everyone to reach. There’s not much else to say.” I asked him what the likelihood was he’d be in Heaven and he said, “I hope it’s above 50%” I began to explain the Gospel and to talk then about the righteousness of God that Christ earns by perfectly fulfilling the Law. I said that because His righteousness was to our credit it was one of the best things about the Gospel but really the most important to realize. (I was thinking at least in your case, because you are just weakly hoping in your own righteousness.) I told him the verses Isaiah 61:10 that predicted one day we would be wrapped in a robe of His righteousness and clothed with His salvation and then in Romans 13:14 that we are clothed with Jesus. “So you don’t go to Heaven because you’re good but because Jesus is good and you are connected to him.” I explained we were adopted and these things were a gift to us. Nothing we did was perfect and we owed God a perfect life and were in debt for all we had done, only Jesus perfect life which is of infinite value because he is God can be a payment for our sin. I told him the Parable in Matthew 22 where the King has a wedding feast and one guy that comes in who does not have on a wedding garment gets thrown into Hell for wearing the wrong clothes to the party. I said that if you try to get into heaven on the basis of what you have done you’ll get thrown out. You have to put on the Robe of Christ’s righteousness. After I explained everything was through God’s power he said he’d want to be forgiven so I walked him through the prayer. We were sitting side by side and I was holding the booklet open explaining the prayer and said he could pray it silently so only God would hear and he would know he was forgiven. “”I’ll take a moment,” he replied and began to silently pray reading the prayer as I held the booklet so I looked down and then he said, “Amen.” I reached out and shook his hand and said, ‘Your sins are forgiven.” And he seemed moved by that. I explained the Christian life to him walking by the Spirit and said, “This is 100%.” Writing that next to his previous answer hoping for over 50%. “Because if you’re trusting in the righteousness of Jesus to be your righteousness; How righteous is Jesus? 100% righteous. And what’s his righteousness worth? An infinite amount so there’s enough for an old cuss like me that’s done a lot of stuff wrong and a young guy like you that hasn’t even done hardly anything yet.” He was grateful I could see to know he was going to Heaven. I gave him the book Bible Promises for You and wrote his name and the date and “forgiven” in the front. He said his dad had a few books like it. I gave him a Bible study on the Deity of Christ. And encouraged him to ask for God’s help in everything.  I invited him to the Bible study again but he lives pretty far from campus in southern Naperville near a new campus that Compass is about to open. I told him I would see him in Heaven and if I saw him around I’d say hi. And I headed out.

So thanks for your prayers for the ministry and for evangelism on campus. God truly blessed this week as 6 students prayed to receive Jesus.

In Him,

Bob