Hey Brothers and Sisters in Christ,

I hope ya had a good day walkin’ with the Lord Jesus.  I keep looking for the peeps and towards the end of the day came upon Jason who prayed to receive Christ.  He was sitting in a first floor lounge in the BIC building when we began to talk.  He had sandy hair and a warm-up jacket on, good looking kid.  At first blush it seemed like Jason had trusted Christ.  When I asked him why God would let him into Heaven he talked about how he liked to worship God and did so a couple times each week at church.  But this is still just a religious work.  He had no assurance of his salvation, but said it was just “believing you’d go” [to Heaven] but it seemed not in the work of Christ to provide for him.  He acknowledged Christ had died when I mentioned this but it didn’t seem essential.  So I asked him where he went to church and he said, “Church of Christ.’  The Chicago Church of Christ around Chicago is not to be confused with the denomination you see as you head south of here, but is a division of the Boston Church of Christ. I t is really something of a low-grade cult.  They preach that you are saved by your works, your baptism (saying you cannot be saved if you are not baptized) and also Christ’s work on the Cross.  But I have yet to meet a Church of Christ kid who mentioned the last of the three.  Still, I went through the Gospel with Jason, and he said he would want to be forgiven.  So trying to help him think about it I said as I often have with religious nominal Christians who are not saved, “When you are praying for forgiveness, are you thinking you will be forgiven because Christ has died for you or because you are good and go to Church?”  His reply was, “I never thought about it before.”  Which did not surprise me given the teaching of the Church he was in, so I explained further how this was what he lacked and he decided to pray to receive Christ.  I had explained that he did not go to Heaven because he was good but because Jesus was good.  And I reinforced this with him, talking him through the work of the Holy Spirit.  I explained he needed to ask the Holy Spirit to fill him in worship and that that was what pleased God (that he worshiped in the Spirit).  I left him with a Bible Study and the book Playing with Purpose about the Christian players in the NBA.  So hopefully he’ll be encouraged by the stories in it and the way those guys are living for Christ.  Please pray the truth of the Gospel penetrates his heart and God, through His Holy Spirit, leads him to a better church.

So thanks for your prayers for the ministry and for Evangelism today if you had a chance.  God was active by His Spirit and blessed.

in Him,

Bob Bollow

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