"And there they preached the gospel." Acts 14:7
After the abortion clinic we went to the University of Minnesota Duluth, where Steve and Josh had already been for an hour with a gospel sign. We joined them and the three guys began taking turns preaching to the crowds of students coming off the busses.
Sue, who we had talked to on Friday, came by again but did not want to talk to my Mom and I. Instead she talked to Steve and Josh who were answering questions and giving the gospel to a group waiting for a bus. She asked them, why did they want to go to Heaven. Steve answered, "Because God is there." She mentioned needing something more and Steve asked "Why would anyone want anything more than God?" She seemed to be on the defensive and we hope that this is because of God's conviction in her heart. We have been praying for her.
God really does prepare us for the particular people He will bring for us to share the gospel with. He brings the ones who have the questions and needs which He has prepared us to answer. It is very comforting to know this, but amazing to experience. My Mom and I were handing out tracts, when an older man began talking to my Mom about how "turned off" he is by "all this born again stuff." He shared his story of a wound inflicted by a loved one claiming to be born again and how he did not want anything to do with being born again, because of it. My Mom was able to share with him a similar experience of hers and told him that we cannot blame God for other peoples actions. At that he seemed to soften and wanted to read one of our tracts! Please pray for Tim (name changed).
As one group of students got off of a bus, I noticed a young man who was looking at our signs. I walked over and handed him a tract, which he took and immediately read from cover to cover. I asked him what he thought about it and he said that he had grown up hearing that God is not as "harsh" as we were portraying Him. I explained the gospel to him using an example Steve had been using, which I think is really good. We can see how much God loves us by looking at Jesus on the cross, that He would take our sins upon Himself and suffer for us like that, the just for the unjust, shows how much He loves us. We can also see how much God hates sin by looking at the cross. When Jesus, God's first begotten son, hung on the cross bearing our sins, God, His Father, crushed Him. Isaiah fifty-three says that in pleased the Lord to bruise Him. God hates sin so much that He poured out the fury of His wrath on His own Son when He was bearing our sins. If God would do that to His own Son, what will He do to unrepentant, unbelieving sinners?
Bryan (name changed) asked what "repent" means. I said "It is a turning away from sin, to God." then explained a little what that means. He wanted to know who he could contact later and talk more about this stuff, so I motioned Steve over who began telling Bryan many of the same things I had already said but in more detail. Bryan asked if he could be saved today! Steve told him, "Yes! The Bible says "Today is the day of Salvation!" Bryan asked if it was not too late for him, because he had lived a rough life. Steve told him that God is merciful and that Jesus bore all his sins on the cross. Bryan said he has many questions, because it is all so new to him. He said that he had been an atheist and that he had just recently started seeing his need for God and had begun to read the Bible. He said that his Dad is an "evangelical Catholic" and that just then he had been on his way to talk to a priest, because they told him that he had to go through classes to get baptized. But he had seen our sign and thought he should talk to us first! Steve told him that he should steer clear of the Catholic church and that one reason for that was even in what Bryan had just said. They told him he needed to go to classes to be baptized, Steve explained, "Jesus said that we need to repent and believe, then be baptized." there is nothing about needing classes in the Bible. Steve offered to take Bryan out to lunch some day soon where they could talk more about all of this, they exchanged contact information and I pray that they will be in touch soon.
I cannot explain what it was like to see someone so tender to the gospel, someone on whose heart God has been working, someone who is on, what I would say is the brink of salvation. We could just see God working on him and I did not want to say or do anything that would turn him away from the Savior. As Steve was talking with him I was strongly impressed that we needed to pray for him before he left. Just before he left, Steve asked him if we could pray for him, then asked me to pray! God is so good!
Please pray for Bryan! Pray that God will save him and will not let the enemy snatch him away.
After that, a guy with a sign came out. His sign said: "Bob loves you, no not like that, embrace Bob" He was an atheist mocking God and the gospel. My Mom spoke with him and found out his name is Saul (name not changed) We pray that God will turn him to be like Paul.
Shortly after he came out, five girls went across the street from us with their own signs which said: "Doesn't God love everyone?" and "I will think what I want", "This is a School, not a Church, keep it to yourself" and some others. Steve began preaching to them, then my Mom, Josh and I went over to talk with them and my Mom gave them the gospel. They claimed to be Christians who did not like our message and did not believe you need to repent to be a Christian. My Mom explained that repent and believe are tied together, you cannot have one without the other and be saved. We left them and Steve went over to them and began preaching very earnestly.
Meanwhile, more atheist had gathered around Saul. They began to mock preaching and to mock God. One falsely accused Michael, turning away, Michael began to pray out loud, thanking God for being counted worthy of false accusation for His name's sake. My Mom and I began to pray out loud, praising God and reading the Bible. The spiritual battle was intense.
We crossed the street to stand with Steve and Josh and to hold signs while Josh caught the action on video camera. Their lawyers have told them to keep the video camera rolling while on the streets, so that if someone does something to hurt us, or the police act against the law, we will have evidence. By this time a crowd had gathered around Steve and more signs had been brought out, one of which said: "I will forgive you for $1" Steve told the guy holding it, "The goodness of God is that His forgiveness is free!" At one point in his preaching, Steve said, "We are out here to warn you. If you were in a burning building, it would be the loving thing to do to warn you. That is what we are doing." A guy on the edge of the crowd said, "You're out here to warn us?" He seemed surprised. We gave him a tract which he took away with him. He seemed to be in a very serious state of mind. As I watched all this taking place and saw Steve pleading with these people and reasoning with them for their souls, I thought "This is the goodness and mercy of God!" 1 Corinthians 1:21 says: "For since in the wisdom of God the world by wisdom knew not God, it pleased god by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe." Also read through to verse 31 !
Another guy began asking Steve some very good questions, which Steve used to preach to the crowd. This guy talked with Steve for a long time! I did not get to hear how it ended.
Still another guy talked with my Mom for a good while, asking many questions. He was very surprised when she quoted Psalms 66:18 "If I regard iniquity in my heart, the Lord will not hear me." He had never heard of that before. Neither had he heard that you can be saved at once ( as in 2Cor. 5:17 "If any man be in Christ, he is a new creation: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.") and do not need to work your way to Heaven and eventually hope to get it right in purgatory. Please pray for him as well.
One lady told me that she is a Christian but thinks our message should be "more loving". I mentioned what I had just read in Mark chapter one, before Jesus even got His disciples, He went all throughout Galilee preaching, "repent, and believe the gospel." She said that He did not tell people like the adulteress that they were going to hell. (For the record, we do not say to specific people, 'you are going to hell', we tell who the Bible says are going to hell. Using verses like, 1Cor. 6:9-10 and Galatians 5:19-21) I told her that those people already knew. The Jews knew the law, they did not need to be told that they were sinners, had broken God's law and were under God's wrath. They needed to be told that the Messiah had come and to believe. Later when Paul preached to the Greeks, he went to the public places and debated with them, beginning at creation, then to the law and finally to the cross. If people do not know their sin and their need for a savior, Jesus will mean nothing to them. He will need to be as He is now being portrayed in most modern evangelism, an accessory to your life, someone who will help you and give you good things. What we have lost is the understanding that these people, who have no concept of the Bible, the Laws of God and the history of those who obeyed and those who did not, do not know they need a savior. We must begin where Paul began, at creation and take it from there. Remember that
tribe in Papua New Guinea? Our nation has become much like those people.
O.K. I did not quite say all of that to this lady, the gist of it was there though and after I was done she said, "I guess I see what you're saying. God bless you!" Then she left.
This was the longest time we have been out pleading for the lost, to date, eight hours! With a one hour break in between. We got cold! We praise God for the opportunity and for His direction throughout the day! I cannot tell you how happy and excited we were on our way home! When we obey the Lord, it sure makes us happy! Perhaps one thing American Christians are lacking is the joy and happiness in obedience?
"For you remember, brethren, our labor and travail: for laboring night and day, because we would not be a burden unto any of you, we preached unto you the gospel of God. 1 Thessalonians 2:9
