Hey Sisters and Brothers in Christ,

I hope your day was blessed with the Grace of God in Christ. I had a good day on campus and Kejsi [pronounced KC] prayed to receive Jesus today. I gave a book to Case who had not heard the Gospel before and gave him The Case for Christ Answer Booklet and he seemed grateful.  I went through the Gospel with a few others too so that was a good day. Her story is below if you have some time, please pray she grows in faith.

 I first bumped into Kejsi talking with a Wheaton student, Aiden, who volunteers with Intervarsity helping them to run their table on campus. I just fist bumped him as I walked by and shook her hand and said hi, just goofing around. They seemed to be talking seriously so I kept walking. Later walking around the Science building she was sitting at a table right across from the vending machines, second floor of the big center lounge. I think because Aiden had prayed with her she recognized me she was willing to do a survey as she ate her cheese and crackers. It turned out she was raised Orthodox and was Albanian. She had long brown hair and cute rounded soft features. She wore no makeup and had on plain grey baggy sweats; the top was a hoodie. She was dating a Christian guy and had just started to go to Church again at Willow Creek. I asked her what she would say to God if she died and He asked, “Why should I let you into Heaven?” “I’d tell Him you shouldn’t, I’m a sinner. I’m not perfect. I repented, you know. I’d tell Him I’m not perfect… I don’t belong in the Kingdom.” I asked her the likelihood she would get into Heaven; she thought maybe 50%. I began to explain the Gospel to her saying that knowing God was that He lived inside her with His Holy Spirit. If God lived in you then He is eternal and the source of life, so you’d have eternal life, one with Him. I said that God can’t live in some because of sin. God has to take away your sin because he cannot be one with sin. “So what is the big thing God does with Jesus to take away your sins?” I asked. “Repentance?” She guessed. I said that God forgives when you repent and this is how it works. So I explained that God comes down to us as a man. “He tells people the truth, so they kill Him, but that’s what Jesus wants, He wants to die because the Bible says without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sin. The Bible says life is in the blood and Jesus is the source of all life so when He pours out His blood he pours out like a life-force on the world and makes life where we made death. There’s death inside us because of our sin. It says in 1John 1:7 the blood of Jesus cleanses us from all sin. So now you are alive inside and you match God so now God can live inside you.” “Oh,” she said like she had never understood that before. I went on to explain Christ’s blood as a payment for sin and the righteousness of God to her credit Jesus earned fulfilling the Law. I said she had to receive Jesus and place her trust in that He was God, died for her sins and rose from the dead. This would mean she had faith in Jesus. It was by grace she was saved through this faith. I then asked if she would want to be forgiven trusting in what Jesus had done, then He would live inside her and take her to Heaven when she died, or if she thought something else. I said it seemed that God was on the outside of her life now. (Then kind of like the woman at the well she stated talking about the mountain or Jerusalem.) She said she was dating a guy who said he did not believe in God and she felt like that had pushed her away from Him. (I checked and the Him she meant was away from God.) The boy cheated on her and was now dating a “super Christian” girl for whom he’s changed his story. He now is saying he believes in God according to his friend she talked to who told her the X BF was insincere. She felt he had broken up with her because she was unwilling to have sex until marriage and cheated on her. I said that it was not likely he was a believer but went back to the question and said that she needed to be forgiven for her sins. I told her, “You need God inside you.” As she talked about a sense she had that Satan was bugging her with thoughts. I said, “One of my most frequent prayers is to pray, ‘Lord take the thoughts of Satan out of my heart.’” She liked that. I said if you want to be forgiven there is a prayer you can pray and I talked her through it asking if it was the desire of her heart. She nodded. I said she could pray it silently right now. I wouldn’t hear her but God would hear and she’d know she was forgiven, “Wanna do that?” I asked. She nodded again and took the booklet and prayed to receive Jesus. When she finished she said, “I feel like you talking to me was not an accident. I was talking to that guy, what’s his name again?” “Aiden,” I replied. “I think he prayed God would give me a sign or something like that. I don’t know exactly what he prayed.” Then she said after praying she felt different, “I feel like a weight lifted off me. I feel relief. I feel happy,” she proclaimed softly. “I don’t’ know how I’m going to explain this to my boyfriend.” I showed her how she could grow in the Christian life and that everything was by the Spirit’s power. Christianity was “Inside out, first you ask God to transform you on the inside, you become a good person and then do good things on the outside. She should just ask God for help in everything. I got out a copy of Bible Promises for You and wrote her name and the date and “forgiven!” in the front and she liked that. She said then she had been raised in an Orthodox family but she did not think of herself that way and asked what the difference in that and in being just a Christian. I explained the Orthodox look to tradition and the Church fathers. But the oldest tradition we have in in the Bible. The Church Fathers talk a lot about works, we don’t have all their writings and don’t know all they taught. But the Bible says you are saved by faith. The Orthodox Church talks a lot about doing good deeds and keeping tradition. She nodded in agreement. I said I thought they were wrong. I told her the likelihood she would now go to Heaven was 100% trusting in the blood and righteousness of Jesus, which are both worth an infinite amount. I said though I was old and had sinned way more than her God was not going to look at our piles of sin but at what Jesus had done for us. I gave her The Case for Christ Answer Booklet and a Bible Study I explained telling her she could do it with her boyfriend. She was happy and I said I would pray a Bible Verse for her each day from now until Spring and one year after asking God to bless her. “If I see ya I’ll just say hi, you don’t have a new stalker or anything,” she grinned at the joke. “Thanks for talking with me you made my day,” I said getting up to go. “You made my day too,” she replied. And I headed off.

 I bumped into Aiden packing up the table and told him the story. “Dude your praying for her led me right to her. I think she talked to me because she knew you knew me and figured I was “OK”. He was happy to hear it saying, “I don’t know exactly what she believed. It was hard to tell.” We hugged each other as I told him, “You get a half sack,” both happy to see someone come to Christ. I know someone is praying for many students I then see pray to receive Christ.

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

 In Him,

Bob