Hey Sisters and Brothers in Christ,

I hope ya had a great day walking with the Lord in the light of His word. I had a good day on campus and after some discipleship stuff with a student I had talked to before for about an hour. Later Dom and Sam each prayed with me to receive Christ. Milo took The Case for Christ Answer Booklet. Please pray they both grow in their faith. Their stories are below if you have time. Thanks for your prayers.

Dom was sitting outside the PE building on a stone half wall with a concrete cap that runs out the second floor doors to the BIC building. It is built into a hill. He had hair like Keanu Reeves, thick, dark brown and straight pouring out past his jaw line from under a baseball cap. His mustache was barely there and he otherwise was clean-shaven though a razor wasn’t needed. He had a straight jaw line and a warm smile, dark eyes and eyebrows smaller nose than Keanu.  He had on a black hoodie and a black and white plaid shirt over it with black sweats on. We sat in the sun and it felt like a perfectly warm day. He was up for doing a survey. Upbeat guy. He seemed to have a good friend that was knowledgeable. They both wanted to take a trip to a fire pit somewhere where you could place yourself in the flames and not be burned when they appear. Like Isaiah 43:2 I guess. I have no idea where that is and he seemed sketchy on the details. I asked him what he would say to God if he’d died and were asked, “Why should I let you into Heaven?” “Um, that’s a tough question,” he replied, thinking and repeating the question aloud.  “I wouldn’t say I deserve to be in Heaven personally.  I’m not the best person I’m not the worst person. I made wrong decisions. It’s about how much of those decisions you regret then how much you repent.” He said if faced with God he would probably just repent but you have to “actually feel sorry and actually repent.” He thought he had a 50/50 chance of going to Heaven. He listened closely to the Gospel and when I asked what Jesus had done to take away his sins he said, “Sacrifice”. Though it did not seem he went to church. I explained that the blood of Jesus was worth an infinite amount and paid God back for all the imperfect things we had done that we owed God something perfect for, so God forgave us because He got paid and so was just. “Fair enough,” he put in in agreement. In the end I asked him if he would want to be forgiven or thought something else and he smiled broadly and said, “Well obviously I’d be forgiven.”  So I said if he wanted to be forgiven there was a prayer he could pray and I walked him through it asking if it was the desire of his heart. “I do like that,” he replied. So I said he could pray it silently and I wouldn’t hear him but God would hear and he’d know he was forgiven saying, “Wanna do it?” “Yeah,” he replied and he took the booklet and prayed to receive Jesus and finished crossing himself and saying, “Amen.” He didn’t have a Bible so I gave him one explaining that a guy who had been in the NFL bought me Bibles to give people and he thought that was great. I wrote his name and the date and “Forgiven,” on the inside. I also gave him Bible Promises for You and a Bible study. I explained living the Christian life by the Spirit’s power. I said now trusting in the righteousness of Jesus to be his righteousness the likelihood he would go to Heaven was 100%. I told him I would keep him in my prayers each day until spring and one year after.  “This was an interesting conversation,” he said. “Maybe if I run into you again my friend will be around he knows a lot of stuff.” I said that would be cool and getting up to go I said, “I’ll see you in Heaven 100%” “Heck yeah,” he replied enthusiastically. “Thank you.” I said, “Sure,” and headed off. I crossed through the sunlight into the BIC building 20 years away.

Just down the hall I came across Sam. He had a mop of sandy curly hair and thin angular features and was in the 2^nd floor hall of the BIC. He was about 6 foot and wore a light blue hoodie and black sweats. He’d gone to a local church for their youth group it seemed and when all his friends had headed off to college his attendance had fallen off. He said he was planning on getting a Bible this week to get into things again. I said that I had just given the one I had away but I had a nice study Bible in my truck and when we were done I could go get it or he could follow me out I was only 10 spaces from the door to the computer lounge. We talked about versions and I explained the version I had was one the conservative Baptists had done for study (HCSB a lot like NKJ). I talked about some other good ones. Asked him what he would say to God to get into Heaven. “I guess I’d answer, I know being a good person won’t qualify you to get into Heaven. You have to share the Gospel and put Him first.” He talked about believing he needed to publicly proclaim the Gospel to merit Heaven. Because he hadn’t really pursued the list of things he thought made you stand out as a follower of Jesus. He thought the likelihood of going to Heaven was on 10% for him right now. He knew Jesus had died for him as I went through the Gospel. But after he fell back on his works being inadequate. I explained to him again that Jesus was why he would go to Heaven and that none of us are perfect in our works. I asked if he had trusted in what Jesus had done to save him or if he was trusting in being good and had not been good enough. I explained living the Christian life by God’s transforming power. And then I read the prayer to him asking him if he thought he had trusted in Christ asking God to forgive him based on what Jesus had done. I said, “It says here, ‘Make me the kind of person You want me to be’. So you’d be asking God to change you, not trying to work to change you by yourself.” He said, “Yeah sure that’s fine,” and prayed to receive Jesus. I told him that now trusting in the righteousness of Jesus to be his righteousness the likelihood he would go to Heaven was 100%. I’ll be praying for him I hope it sank in. We walked out to my truck and I got him a Bible and wrote his name and the date and “forgiven!’ in the front with Ephesians 1:13 that I had explained promised that when he believed the Spirit entered him and sealed him giving him the strength to live the Christian life. Then he could ask for God to transform him to do what God wanted. He was happy and thanked me and shook my hand. I also gave him Bible Promises for You and a Bible Study. We parted ways then.

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

In Him,

Bob