Battle Log
Friday 25 November 2022
Posted 25 November 2022, 10:30 AM by Glen Richards. Permalink
We are currently starting day 7 (Friday) of 7 of the Schoolies 2022 outreach on the Gold Coast of Australia.
We have been super busy in gospel ministry. Since Monday (day 3) we have been in the following routine: 3 hours of online outreach in the morning, 2 hours on Cavill Avenue in the afternoon, and then 2 and a half hours on Cavill Avenue in the evening. It’s been a busy week, but well worth it! And the routine has really helped me get through.
I’m going to give only a few of the many highlights from the week so far (and only from my perspective; I’m hearing wonderful testimony from all the others on the team too!), but it’s all blurring together, so I can’t remember on which day / time each interaction occurred.
First, I want to talk about my conversation with Khye (pictured). I honestly couldn’t tell you if they were a he or a she – they claimed to be asexual. I’m going to use ‘she / her’. I was actually heading over to engage two other kids when she came past, so I decided to ask her what happens after life instead. She responded with ‘I don’t care’. I asked her if she believed in God - that was a negative. And I could see the challenge in her eyes. She was up for a fight. I instinctively knew that following the script here wasn’t wise, so I didn’t go to ‘building / builder’. I can’t quite remember what I said, but whatever it was, it totally disarmed her, and we fell into conversation. Soon she said, “I don’t care, but I’m happy to talk about it, but can we sit down?”, and so we did. She was open now, but I spent a lot of time listening. I still went through the law and the gospel – and even the building / builder analogy, but just not in the usual order. I actually had to address why God allows evil and suffering early in the chat – she had experienced a lot of that. It was a long chat, and a special chat. She thanked me for the way I went about it, comparing me to those preachers that try to ‘shove it down my throat’. As pictured, she accepted a gospel of John and a tract as she left. I took some time to specially pray for her immediately after that chat. Please pray for conviction and conversion.
Another highlight was a chat with a kid who was walking past with his mates. He had a bottle of booze in his hands. He was keen to chat, but his mates weren’t, and moved off. Eventually one of them came back and gave him the four pack of booze that his first bottle had come from. He had a good understanding of the gospel (maybe he had talked to one of the other team members on a previous outreach?) - he did really well on the check questions. But it was obvious from what he was saying that he wasn’t saved. It was a long chat, where I went through the whole ‘script’ making sure he knew salvation was a gift, yet a gift that would change him. Through the chat, he had finished off 2 bottles of booze and was on to his 3rd! At the end, I challenged him on his drinking. This is going to sound strange, but he seemed genuinely surprised that drunkenness was a sin. A look of conviction came over him, he instantly said he would go and chuck the booze, but he asked if he could take a selfie with me first - no problem. He accepted a gospel of John and a tract, shook my hand, then walked straight for the bin. I had the presence of mind to whip my phone out and take 2 photos of him as he chucked the booze in the bin. I then watched him walk off down the mall flicking through the gospel of John I had given him. I leave him in God’s capable hands. The law ploughs and convicts, but the gospel is the power of God for salvation. Please pray for him too.
There have been many other chats, with people becoming deeply engaged in conversation, and forgetting time as they are able to start articulating the deepest questions they have – or even didn’t know they had till now. People’s worldviews have been deeply challenged, sometimes, maybe, for the first time. Last night, I had multiple guys say, there is nothing stopping them from trusting Christ right now, but they just needed time to process what’s been discussed. That’s fair, and yet I noted the simplicity of the message I shared and explained the urgency in responding. God is sovereign in salvation, I do my job to the best of my ability, and in his strength, and then leave the rest to him.
Be encouraged to continue to grow in your evangelism training and efforts. Pray for and take those opportunities that come in everyday life :) May God bless you as you step out in faith!
Thanks to Hung and Damo for the photos of me (Glen) in this report.
View previous Special Outreaches report (24 November 2022)
Special Outreaches (QLD, Australia)
Australia Day (26 January)
Easter Monday
ANZAC Day (25 April)
Labour Day
Riverfire Outreach
Queen's Birthday
Halloween
Schoolies
Christmas Outreaches (December)
New Years Eve (31 December)
Contact Ryan Hemelaar for more information.