Hi Everyone

Well, we have broken the back of the Schoolies outreach, and are now on the downward track to the end of the week! We give glory to God for sustaining us thus far, and look forward to another day of outreach!

At 9am we jumped online for 3 hours of evangelism:

One guy from the UK was surprised that I would be asking such deep questions. He really wanted to engage me. So when I asked him what happens after we die, he said he would go to heaven. We broke down what that meant, and the standard he would have to keep, and, as per the scriptures, his mouth was stopped. He said yes when I asked him how he could avoid his hell punishment, so I gave him the glorious gospel. When I asked him when he should repent and place 100% of his faith in Christ, he said as soon as possible! I was able to give him some guidelines as to where to download a Bible and find a good church. He thanked me for the chat. What a great chart to start the day!

Aleejah from the US was another great chat. She realised that if there was a God then she would be in big trouble on judgement day. But I told her that if she placed all her faith in Christ for the forgiveness of her sins, she would definitely go to heaven. She started crying (I couldn’t see her face, but could hear her sobbing). She said thank you so much, and I said that I couldn’t wait to see her in heaven!

Chris from Texas was another good one. I took a bit of time trying to prove the existence of God, but once he agreed, the rest of the conversation went with ease. He admitted that he needed to place his faith in Christ, but didn’t seem to be bothered when that would be. I asked him when he was going to die, and he said ‘Oh, then I better do it now’. I gave him a link to the Bible, and where to find a good church. I said I would seek him out in heaven and shake his hand, but he said he would give me a big hug!

Maneesh from India kept me talking for nearly an hour, debating the existence of God. I had to cut him off to get to things spiritual and took him through the law and Gospel. At the end he said that he was still going to trust in his Hindu religion.

So I left the online chat praising God that he has allowed a wretch like me to join in His work for Him!

We came back from lunch, then continued our Bible study in 1 Cor, moving to chapter 3.

Then it was back down for our afternoon outreach.

I approached a couple of lads to talk to. One was engaged, and the other tried to pull him away. He told him to leave him alone, because he wanted to chat, so the other walked off in a huff. We discussed deep things, and he was very thankful of the conversation, although he told me nothing will change. I just have to leave him in God’s hands.

Gabe & Will – this was a great chat, both were humbled by the law, and listened intently of how to be free of it. They both agreed they would read the Bible to find out more, and I urged them to not think too long, as they didn’t know when they were going to die.

3 kids I approached seemed excited at first, but 2 peeled away and left the girl to fend for herself. This was refreshing, as I don’t approach girls on their own, and don’t get a lot of chats with them. She listened intently, and thanked me afterwards. I didn’t detect any heart change, but I’ll leave that part to God!

Ben, Flynn & Toby – as we gathered to pray at the end, I felt compelled to engage with these 3 walking past, and I’m glad I did, because they all responded very positively to what was said. 2 of them showed real remorse for their sin and an eagerness to do something about it. It was a great chat, and a great lesson for me in obedience in listening to the Holy Spirit’s prompting!

We all had a lot to talk about over dinner, with reports of positive results in the outreach. All glory to God!

After watching God’s glory in a beautiful sunset, we headed down for our evening outreach.

I found this hard going, as it seemed most were just up for a good argument. Maybe the kids had run out of alcohol money, or something!

Sunni was back with us tonight, eager to learn in evangelism. She was teamed up with Ryan, and had engaged a guy who peeled off from the conversation. All he wanted to do was argue. People who argue are not really interested in learning, but want to get their message across. From my earlier experiences, I learnt the hard way not to bite back and fuel the fire. We all went back and forth for a while debating evolution, who wrote the Bible etc. He didn’t want to listen, so I pulled the pin on the conversation, and let him walk away.

We stopped a group of girls, and Sunni took the lead in engaging them. The girl told us she was a Christian, but took exception to the way we were going about doing evangelism. Her non-Christian friends waded in and told us the same thing. Sunni asked her how she did it – good question, as it puts them on the spot. She said she doesn’t really do it (normal for those who take exception for those that do), but if she did, she would come alongside with them in life, and wait for the opportunity to talk spiritual things with them. I said that’s fine if you were a life coach, but not for evangelism. I pointed to a drunk kid staggering down the street and asked her “what if that guy stumbled in front of a bus tonight, and you had been waiting for the opportunity to talk to him about Jesus. Where would he go?” She said to hell, so I tried to stress the urgency behind what we should be doing. I turned the conversation around to her, asking her how sure was she that she was going to heaven when she died. She said pretty sure, which set off alarm bells for me. I asked her if she was going to jump out of a plane and she was pretty sure there were no holes in the parachute, would she still jump? She backtracked and said no, she was sure she was going to heaven, but got a bit tongue-tied with her earlier answer. I asked her if she reads her Bible every day. She answered no, not every day. But she ate every day, so I stressed that she won’t grow spiritually if you don’t eat the meat of God’s word every day. We parted on good terms, but I feared for her spiritual walk.

I had one good conversation, with 2 boys, Callum & Nico. They were both very respectful and agreed they needed to place their faith in Christ before it was too late. 

All my other chats were hard ploughing, but God gets all the glory regardless!

Blessings

Craig