Thursday, due to the weather, I spent the whole day in online outreach instead of heading to the bus stops.
In the morning session the stand out conversation was with a guy who had more melanin in his skin than me. He had obviously had Christian instruction in his life, because he had an understanding of some concepts, but he was completely blind to the gospel and he was resistant to it. He was open to talk though, and so I laboured with him for a long time. He had received some philosophical indoctrination that caused him to keep going back to “before God and Jesus…”. I had to keep trying to remind him how we know there was nothing before the true God. He would struggle, and then revert back. At one point he started talking about evolution, and how african’s have 100% human DNA, and others, like europeans have less than that (something in the 90’s). I was shocked - here is the root of racism! I pointed it out to him. And I said, all people are 100% human, because we are made in the image of God. For this reason, we all have value. We parted on good terms.
From the afternoon session, I will mention three conversations.
The first brought me to tears afterwards. I was connected to a mildly curious lady, who started getting more and more engaged. She heard clear and logical gospel reasoning, and she started asking questions. Then she started crying, and she opened up about some very painful issues from her life. I had the privilege of ministering hope to her. At the end of the conversation, she asked me to pray for her, which I gladly did. I then prayed for her more after the conversation ended, and broke down in tears myself. Oh, what a scourge sin is - oh how wonderful the balm of the gospel. Oh, Lord, have mercy. May she place her trust in you alone Jesus for the forgiveness of her sin.
Later, I was connected to a lady from Brazil. She too started hearing clear and logical gospel reasoning, she became engaged, and started asking questions. Then her phone rang. She answered it, and then came back to me and said, “wait five minutes, ok?”. She then went out the door. She had to do something but didn’t want the conversation to end, so I decided to wait. Sure enough, she came back and said, “one more minute!”. I smiled as she headed out again. Within a minute she was back and ready to continue the conversation! We continued to talk, but she seemed to get to a point where she was overloaded, and needed time to process what she was hearing. She had more questions, but now wasn’t the time. I gave her a link to needGod.net where she could ask more questions if she wanted to. It was a wonderful chat.
The final conversation I’ll mention was with a girl who only wanted to type her responses (fine with me), and she didn’t show her face (I’m pretty sure it was a girl). She was very open, and seemed to come to grasp the gospel, going from thinking “just be a good person and do good things” would get her to heaven, to “have trust in Jesus; [who] died for my sins”. Some of her other comments: “yeah i’m actually not as stressed”, “thank you so much for telling me this :))”, and “i’m literally so thankful that you were the person i found and not some scary naked dude”.
The gospel + abortion outreach was peacful and wonderful. Read about it here.
We then moved to Cathedral Square. Marty preached, there was a good crowd listening. There were a lot of other Christains around engaging people with the gospel. I had three wonderful one to one conversations. The highlight was one with a guy who was drunk and stoned. In spite of his condition, the hope of the gospel seemed to be having an effect - he seemed deeply impacted. I gave him two types of tracts, and I told him to put them in his pocket and ready them when he had a clear head.
A team of us then headed towards Cashel Mall. Before we had even made it there, we had gospel conversations with four individuals!
We then spent a busy couple of hours bringing the hope of the mercy of God to people. It was great to have Graham with us again. He had been watching the Operation 513 online evangelism via You Tube, and was able to use the tips he had been learning to great effect in his walk up conversations.
I finished the day of outreach with a couple more hours of online evangelism in the evening. The highlight conversation was with two guys who were extremely slow at grasping basic concepts. I was tired from a long day, and I wanted to give up. But I didn’t. Jesus didn’t just die for those that are sharp in mind. The gospel makes it possible for anyone to be made right with God. So I laboured with them, as they were open to it. It took time, but they seemed to come to grasp the gospel intellectually. Yet only God can change hearts, may there new found understanding of the gospel, turn to the joy of salvation.
God, thank you for all you do. Thank you for life, thank you that you died for us to give us the gift of eternal life! May you receive the reward of your suffering. Save people for your glory Lord. Amen.
View previous Christchurch (NZ) report (22 July 2020)
Christchurch (NZ) Team
Weekly outreaches:
Tue 3:30pm - 5:30pm - Riccarton (corner of Riccarton Rd and Rotherham St)
Fri 1:30pm - 3:30pm - City (Bridge of Remembrance)
Sat 11am - 1pm - Riccarton (corner of Riccarton Rd and Rotherham St)
Sun 1:30pm - 3:30pm - City (corner of Colombo St and Cashel St).
Contact Glen Richards or Andy Barlow for more information.