Saturday 02-27-10

I helped Tom out with a WOTM crash course. We only had a couple of people and no one was able to go out on the street in the evening for different reasons. I was still planning on going out, and some others (that hadn’t been to today’s class) were going to meet me out there.

Well, I got there a little earlier than usual, and no one else was around yet, so I started handing out some tracts. After an hour, no one else had showed up yet, so I got out the speaker to do some open air. I had a few bucks for trivia questions in order to draw a crowd. There were some people nearby waiting for the traffic light to change, and they answered the first few trivia questions and one of them decided to go for the Good Person test.
As I took him through, he admitted to lying, stealing, blasphemy and adultery in the heart. But when asked if he would be found innocent or guilty, he said, “innocent, because Jesus forgives all our sins.” Well, almost.

I tried to explain that if you’re innocent, you don’t need forgiveness. Simply by stating that he was forgiven is proof itself that he knew he was guilty. But he wouldn’t go there, and said he didn’t want to participate any longer. But he and his friends stayed at the light while I went through the Gospel and explained that we’re all guilty and deserve hell. But that Jesus Christ came down, lived a perfect life and then suffered and died on the cross, taking on the punishment that we deserve, and on the third day, He rose again, defeating death forever.
I then explained the two things that we must do in order to make this sacrifice pertain to us – repent of our sins and trust in Jesus Christ alone.

Dan showed up during this, and Alan got there a little later. We continued handing out tracts and talking to people. Marcus and Phil stopped by, but they had their own speaker, so they moved on to another street corner.

I did some more trivia, still didn’t draw much of a crowd, but a guy in a wheelchair stuck around after he got a couple of the questions. He was willing to go through the Good Person Test, so we went through that. It turns out that he wasn’t a good person, but a self proclaimed lying, coveting thief and a blaspheming adulterer at heart just like the rest of us. He realized that he would be found guilty before God and sent to hell. That thought did concern him, so I explained the Gospel to him, and left him with a “Are You Good Enough to Get into Heaven?” tract and a Book of John. He told me that he’d lost his leg about a year ago and had rejected God after that, but now he had a new understanding. His name is James, please keep him in prayer.

I talked to another guy later in the evening named Nate. He claimed to be a believer, but smelled of alcohol and cursed a bit when we were talking. I left him with a tract to read later. Please pray that the Lord would work in his life, convicting him of the sins he’s still holding onto and bring him to complete repentance and salvation.

My speaker ran out of power and it was starting to rain, so we headed out. I stopped to talk with Marcus and Phil at the other corner where they were. This was interesting – probably the best part of the night. There was a woman with them that I recognized from the atheists that used to come out to oppose the street preaching. Her name is Michelle, I think. I was talking to Phil and he said she was a new believer! She was even defending the Bible to an obnoxious guy that had stopped to argue with them.
Tom and I had talked to her and her boyfriend a month or so ago, and he seemed more open than she was at the time. I didn’t get a chance to talk to her, but was glad to hear that she had become a believer. It’s awesome when God allows us to see a change like this in someone.

Recently, at our men’s group, a guy had given his testimony. He had become a Christian about a month ago, and was an outspoken atheist prior to that. When he started looking into evolution and Christianity, he found that the Christian belief actually made sense and he could no longer deny that.

Glory to God!