Battle Log

• Battle Log
• Page 249

Friday, 9 July, 2010

Posted 17 July 2010, 6:14 PM by Ryan Hemelaar. Permalink

The past two weeks we have been hassled firstly by the police, and then last week by the council. But in the end, both gave us permission to be there and do what we do. Praise God! So we were thinking that we wouldn't have to deal with them tonight and we didn't.

For when we met together for a time of prayer, one of local law officers from week was walking around with a different local law officer. That new officer was about to say something to us about us handing tracts, when the other officer tapped him on the shoulder saying that we were alright.

In our usual spot, a busker was already playing. So we decided to move up to the middle of the mall in a big open area and preach there. So I set up my soap box and started preaching. I had a few hecklers, mostly Muslims. One of the Muslims seemed a liberal, not even believing that Jesus existed! After showing him why it is indisputable that Jesus lived, they all got stuck on the idea that Jesus died on the cross. This is strange, because Muslims think that Jesus is coming back in the future and then He will die. So why they get all up in arms about Him dying 2000 years ago is beyond me.

The spot where I was preaching was fairly decent, with lots of people in hearing range. But after I got down, we decided that preaching on the permanent 'stage' was probably a good idea too. So Blake got up and preached faithfully about the cross of Jesus. As did another guy named Ryan after him.

After this, we noticed that there was a guy in the middle of the mall who had decent crowd around him. We thought he must be a busker. I decided that it would be a good idea to preach closer to him, so the crowd could hear the message too. As I was getting up to preach, the man in the middle of the crowd and the crowd too started moving towards me (probably heading past me). But as they were right at me, Rhoi wolf whistled and said, "Everyone, listen to this man" (pointing to me). Then I began preaching, and went through the good person test with the man who had attracted the crowd (he was wrapped in plastic). So this meant I had the man and all the crowd now listening to me. Praise God how it worked out! I was amazed. I preached about how there is a judgement to come, and since we have all sinned we need forgiveness that is only offered in Jesus.

This is a video filmed a little after that happened:

After it all settled down, Luke got up and preached a location further down the mall and almost immediately had some atheist hecklers. This was perhaps Luke's first time preaching in the open air, and he did a great job.

To God be the glory for another great night!

More photos of this outreach

Friday, 2 July, 2010

Posted 17 July 2010, 5:32 PM by Ryan Hemelaar. Permalink

This was now the second week having the Gold Coast team on a Friday night instead of Saturday afternoon. We thought we shouldn't have any problems with police tonight, after they gave us permission to preach last week.

It was a drizzly night, however there were still lots of people about. The good thing about the rain is that it kept the buskers away. So this week we didn't have to try and compete with them.

On the team tonight we had: Josh, Blake, Jeremy, Bekk and I. We began preaching the gospel and had a few hecklers. However, while Josh was preaching the rest of us were handing out gospel tracts and then two council local law officers came up to Bekk and I. They said that they have no problem with the preaching, however the handing out of gospel tracts they considered touting. I asked how that could be so and pulled up the Gold Coast City Council local laws on my phone, and went to the one that defines touting.

“tout” means to approach another person and publicise either verbally or in writing a business, commercial or trade activity. (Local Law 5)

So I told them that under the Gold Coast law, handing out of gospel tracts is not considered touting. One of them responded, "But I still think it is." I said something to this effect, "You a local law officer, and so you can only make judgement based on what is the law, not based on what you want the law to say." They said, "Look, get approval from the council to do it and then that will be fine. Then we can know you are not handing inappropriate materials behind our backs as well as these gospel tracts." I responded, "We have tried investigating it with the council, and other local officers we have talked to say it is not illegal, therefore it is not possible to get a permit for something that is not illegal. Moreover, how will getting approval stop the possibility of someone handing out something different behind your backs?" They couldn't really respond and just said, "We are giving you an order to stop handing them out or we will fine you."

I then let Josh know about what they said. And Josh thought it was the silliest thing he has heard! He wanted to go up to them and hand out tracts right in front of them, but they had already left. But a bit later we made a strolled up the mall, and found them in a restaurant. So we decided to hand out tracts outside the restaurant they were in so it would be hard for them to miss us.

They then came up to Josh and Jeremy and said that they couldn't hand out tracts because they thought it was touting. Josh said, "Really? According to Gold Coast law it's not. Go ahead and fine us, and we'll make sure to take it to court. They were like, "Na, we don't want that." In the conversation, they kept changing the reason why we couldn't do it - from 'touting' to 'people could slip on it if they step on it'. Then they decided to call their local law HQ, and they asked the person there about handing out of Christian literature. The person on the phone (who was loud enough to hear) said, "Handing out of Christian literature is exempt from the touting law." At this point the law local officers' manner changed dramatically and they began being friendly, probably realising that we could report them for hassling us and trying to make us to stop doing something that is not illegal.

We were very happy with the outcome, and so began handing out tracts even more fervently in the remaining minutes left of the outreach.

We have now received approval from both the police and council, so hopefully next week we won't have any hassles.

To God be the glory!

Saturday, 10 July, 2010

Posted 17 July 2010, 4:42 PM by Josh Williamson. Permalink

The Bible is a Neolithic book! It was written in the Neolithic period! You cannot trust it!

Wayne was in fine form tonight. The heckling began while Alex (not the Atheist) was preaching. I stood in back play listening to the ramblings that is Wayne. Yarran and I were discussing some of the arguments that Wayne was using, and we both found it interesting that in the Neolithic period (allegedly) there was no alphabet or writing, so we were both confused how the Bible was supposed to be written some 4000 - 5000 years before the invention of the alphabet. But let’s not let facts get in the way of a good heckle.

Alex dealt with Wayne for some time, and then Wayne must have been on repeat because once again he went back to the Neolithic argument. It was at this point I jumped in and began to deal with the heckling.

I asked Wayne for proof of the Bible being written then, and his best argument was, “Genesis says there was a talking snake and unicorns”. But then his argument changed slightly to say that the oral tradition began in the Neolithic times.

When I challenged Wayne on these points and made an apologetic showing how unicorn, doesn’t have to mean a mythical one horn horse, but rather it could be a one horned animal and that the talking snake was actually Satan talking via the snake. I concluded by saying for you to disprove the Genesis account, your main argument has to be against God, you have to disprove Him.

Well that sent us on another round of heckling. Wayne the atheist started to talk about how some things are immoral etc. So I asked him on what basis does he make a judgement on something being immoral? His reply was that society determines what is right and wrong. So I took him a step further and said, “What if one society condones child rape, is that ok?” And Wayne replied by saying that it is universally wrong. Now he had an issue, how can right and wrong be determined by individual societies and yet there still be absolutes?

This was a question Wayne was unwilling to answer. So I put to him, “To say that something is immoral requires there be a universal moral law, which is not tainted by our own society values, if that is the case then there needs to be a moral law giver, who is outside of our domain, that is the being we call God. For there to be right and wrong, there must be one who determines right and wrong. An atheist cannot have a moral basis apart from God.”

At this stage Wayne was happy to let another heckler take over, this heckler had the deep theological thought of “What happens to the souls of cars when they die?” To which I simply replied, “Well that depends if they run on LPG or Petrol”.

The rest of the heckling for the night was fairly tame. We had some good one to ones and many tracts were handed out.

Praise God for a good evening.

View photos from the outreach, here.

The following is from Ryan Hemelaar about a certain conversation he had:

Doctor S backslides from atheism?

On Saturday, I got into a conversation with "Doctor S" from the Brisbane Atheist Group. We started talking about the Ontological argument - specifically Plantinga's formulation of it. Not sure what that is? Read it below:

1. It is possible that a maximally great being exists.
2. If it is possible that a maximally great being exists, then a maximally great being exists in some possible world.
3. If a maximally great being exists in some possible world, then it exists in every possible world.
4. If a maximally great being exists in every possible world, then it exists in the actual world.
5. If a maximally great being exists in the actual world, then a maximally great being exists.
6. Therefore, a maximally great being exists.

A maximally great being would a necessary being, therefore if he can exist is some possible world, he must exist in every possible world (because he's necessary), including our own. Doctor S admitted that the argument is logical and he knows of no way of refuting it. So I asked whether he now believes the conclusion of the argument. He answered, "I'll have to go home and see whether anyone else has refuted the argument." I responded, "If no one has, will you then believe it?" He answered, "No, because it doesn't mean that no one has been able to refute it and just can't find it." So I said, "This shows you actually have a vested interest in not believing in God because you are unwilling to believe under any circumstances. For this argument is logical with its premises supported, so therefore it is not just a matter of the conclusion possibly or probably following from the premises, it means that the conclusion to the argument logically and necessarily follows."

After a bit of further discussion, he said, "I can admit there is a maximally great being, but that doesn't mean a 'God'." I asked, "But is not a being who is omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent, omnibenevolent, and so on, 'God'?" He refused to admit this. He tried to maintain that admitting that there is a maximally great being does not mean he is no longer an Atheist. I disputed this point with him, letting him know what is the standard definition of atheism in the field of Philosophy (according to the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy) - it doesn't mean lacking a belief in God, it rather means the belief that there is no God.

He then went on to try and deny logic to get around the predicament he was in, but I pointed out to him that logic is the basis for all rational discussion and so he cannot do that.

Soli Deo Gloria!

Saturday, 3 July, 2010

Posted 17 July 2010, 4:30 PM by Josh Williamson. Permalink

As I made my way into the city I couldn’t help but wonder if tonight was going to be the night that I get seriously injured. The reason for this thought was not because I had experienced some strange prophecy or because I had feelings, but rather it was because the week previous a young Muslim man came in with a couple of his mates. For the most part they were loud, hostile, but yet non-violent. However at the end of the night one of them went to pull a knife on me. He left with a promise that he would be back the following week with a gang to take me down. Ahh… the religion of “peace”.

David and I were both on the look out, but by God’s grace nothing major happened from these jihad wannabes, in fact the Muslim gang was as scarce as a pork chop in Mecca. There was no sign or Allah Akbar from them.

Now that isn’t to say the night was boring, far from it. Instead of Afghani teenage terrorists we had loud mouthed drunk atheists. While Ryan was preaching this one rough looking bloke came up and began to scream and curse. Normally hecklers like this are golden as they draw a crowd, however, this guy would yell, rant and rave but then walk away and start ranting to the crowd. So after Ryan tried to deal with him in the open air, I thought it wise to go talk to him one to one.

The drunk atheist got in my face and began yelling at me. As he yelled I found myself being covered in spit and chewed up dinner, but apart from that he wasn’t too bad. It turns out that this man had some deep hurts. His mother had died recently and his wife was tragically killed in a car accident. He wanted to know why God allowed death and suffering. When I tried to answer he just became more hostile, so I said to him, “You don’t really want an answer do you?” To which he agreed, he was just after someone to blame and God seemed like a good scapegoat. He then said Christianity didn’t have any answers and walked away calling me a coward. A title that confused me, since I was the one who came up to him and tried to answer his questions, and he is now walking away. I guess that makes one a coward…

The rest of the night was fairly tame. Ryan preached, Dave preached and Blake preached. There wasn’t much more heckling, but there were some great one to ones.

To God Be the Glory!

South-East England (UK) Team

Saturday, 3 July, 2010

Posted 6 July 2010, 7:54 PM by Andrew Noble. Permalink

We met a cafe nero Brentwood High st, for a quick revision of what the Gospel was and how we ought preach it.  The team consisted of Ruth, Nina and myself (Andrew).  After a brief chat and prayer we headed to the main pedestrian areas to try converse with people.

We all found people rather unresponsive but still managed to hand many tracts out.  I happened to run into a hare krishna who was also handing out books and chatting to folk.  Initially he didn't want to talk to me but after I offered to by a copy of the bhagavad gita he opened up a little. 

His name was Prima and he was born into a hare krishna family. 

It was evident that Prima didnt like discussing the nature of truth or whether hare krishna beliefs were objectively valid, so I took the conversation very carefully so as not to challenge him with too much too quickly.  Surprisingly to me, he use certain Christian terms like "sin" and "repentance" and they appeared to carry the same definitions.

The major differences arose when the Moral Law was discussed and how one atones for their law breaking.  Prima felt that God was going to turn a blind eye to his sin and I gently tried to explain from Isa 64.6 and Mark 7.20-23 that both he and I are more wicked than he is concluding.  He felt that chanting his krishna lines dissolved his sin and he would get to a higher consciousness. 

Prima took a tract and I left him with a number of things to consider, but I'm quite certain he is very closed to the Gospel at this moment.  Only the Holy Spirit can do this impossible work!! Lord grant Prima repentance!!!  Amen.

South-East England (UK) Team

Saturday, 19 June, 2010

Posted 3 July 2010, 5:03 PM by Andrew Noble. Permalink

This saturday I was reluctant to go up the street and witness.  I was tired and I had things to do, the weather was patchy rain and I figured I was the only person going up the high st to evangelize.  Well, I was the only person on the high st evangelizing but I had one of the best afternoons sharing the gospel yet...

I began with handing tracts out and eventually two young teenagers both called Tom stopped and chatted.  They really seemed to be listening to my words and clearly perceive the weightiness of the matter.  They both took more tracts and I encouraged them to read their Bibles and seriously consider the problem of sin and eternal punishment vs repentance and faith. 

I next encountered a young man named Mark who was hanging with his emo friends.  He got a concise Gospel message and when his friends came over to see what I was talking to him about, they all got tracts and a brief Gospel message too.  Next a young man named Adam stopped to see if He was a "Good Person".

It turns out he use to go to church but since moving out of his parents house, he seemed to have fallen away from fellowship.  (I am guessing he may have been a false convert or just never submitted to Christ in the first place) The Law and the Gospel was discussed and he had much to think about afterwards. 

I also met another local pastor who was very keen to hook up and chat regarding evangelism.  I am always keen to see local churches unite to continue the Great Commission of our Lord.

Before I went to leave, I saw a lady from my church that I had recently met.  Her is Jane Robb and she is 62.  She suffers from arthritis but still spends 3 days a week evangelizing the people who sit on the benches in the high st.  A further 3 days in the week she stays at home and studies the Bible and Sundays are for Church!  She has been doing this bench evangelism for 10 years. I felt very humbled and encouraged to see someone so passionate to share Christ in their later years.

Even though I was sharing Christ solo, I was blessed by having some of the best and most enjoyable conversations with many locals in my town.  May God grant repentance, Amen.

Friday, 25 June, 2010

Posted 3 July 2010, 3:20 PM by Ryan Hemelaar. Permalink

Tonight was the first time we have had the Gold Coast team on a Friday night. We made the change because more people seem to be available on Friday nights than on Saturday afternoons.

The car was packed as we made our way to Surfers Paradise for a 7pm outreach start. When we were trying to find a park, we noticed that there were a lot more cars, so once we finally found a spot, we had to walk quite a bit further to get to Cavill Ave.

Once Josh, Jeremy, Bekk and I arrived, we met up with Rick, Joel, Kyosti, Oliver and Blake. We firstly sought out the best place to preach. For our usual spot is not good at night, as it is not lit up, so not many people hang around that part. We chose a spot in the middle of Cavill, but then a busker decided to start setting up right next to us before we started preaching.

So we decided to go down to the bottom of the mall outside Hard Rock Cafe, and this seemed like a perfect location. For there was enough room for a crowd to gather, and there was lots of people flowing through.

After a time in prayer, Jeremy was the first man up to preach. He did a great job proclaiming loudly the message of the gospel. During this time, the same busker who had started setting up while we were at the other area came over and started setting up next to us here! So Josh went over to him to let him know that we got to this spot first and it wouldn't really work with both of us being here. He agreed, and then went to another spot.

I then got up to preach and a bunch of young girls began to heckle. I asked them whether they thought they'd go to Heaven and they thought they would because they are good people. After going through the commandments with them, they realised that they didn't deserve Heaven and that wasn't good news to their ears. So some of them wanted to leave, but I was able to quickly get the gospel in before they left. Some of the girls returned later however.

After I finished preaching, another busker came and was starting to set up his amps. I went over to him and said that it wouldn't really work having both of us here at the same time. We told him that we'd be here till 10pm. He was only allowed to busk till 10pm, so we made an agreement that we'd stop preaching at 9:30pm, and he'd get a good solid half hour after that to play without us preaching nearby.

By this time, Josh had already started preaching. After not too long, Josh had a vocal heckler that was asking questions like, "If God is loving, why did He make Hell?" and saying things like "Since we've all sinned, we all deserve Hell, so why are you preaching?" Josh was able to repond to his questions and then start going through the commandments with him. But as he was getting to the gospel, two police officers came over and had a chat to Josh. They were wondering whether the hecklers were giving him grief. Josh said no. They said they had received a few complaints, but then said that there was nothing wrong with us preaching here. They mentioned that they could hear Josh preaching all the way down the street. Josh took that as a great complement. They then suggested to Josh to maybe lower his voice level down just a touch.

Thank you to the Gold Coast Police for giving us permission to preach.

Here is a video of the events that took place:

As the police were leaving, Josh started preaching again. However, the busker then just started playing his music, way before our agreed time. So Josh had to preach at his loud voice level again to try and compete with the amp that the busker had. It was very hard to compete with him. And once Jeremy preached after Josh, it was very difficult to hear the preacher. So we decided to just hand out tracts and have one2one conversations until the busker left.

After the busker left, Blake then got up a preached the message of the gospel faithfully, even while having a few hecklers asking him questions.

It was a great night overall! Praise God for His faithfulness. Friday nights 7pm-10pm is the perfect time to have this team.

Saturday, 19 June, 2010

Posted 25 June 2010, 1:06 PM by Josh Williamson. Permalink

 Saturday, 12th June, 2010 

I was running late for the city tonight, but Ryan was able to cover me. Upon arrival, I found that we had a serious preaching problem. Normally we need three preachers to get us through the night, but this night we only had two. Blake had lost his voice so was unable to preach. But by God’s grace Ryan and I would be able to preach through the night.

After a bit of a discussion Ryan got up first and began to preach. Following the usual outline, Ryan preached and Wayne heckled.

For over an hour Ryan preached and dealt with a few hecklers. Wayne had some good arguments tonight on does the bible contradict itself, and he even produced arguments I have never heard of before. But a quick study of the texts showed that there was no contradiction, but full points to Wayne for effort.

During Ryan’s open air, I was able to have a discussion with a man who has study the Bible with Jehovah Witnesses, Mormons and other cults. He was telling me about his Hebrew and Greek studies, but it soon became clear that his understanding of the original languages wasn’t very good. He, like Wayne, wanted to show the Bible is full of contradiction, but each one he produced showed the Scripture had no internal errors.

At about 11:15pm Ryan finished preaching and during this time there were some great one to ones occurring. If you looked around our section of the Queen Street mall you couldn’t help but notice that the team was locked in many spiritual conversations.

At 11:30pm I stood to preach and nearly straight away Wayne began to heckle. He used the same old arguments, so I answered and presented the Gospel. Then about five older hecklers arrived, all of who were drunk out of their skull. They began to slur and heckle, I couldn’t understand what they were on about, but they were convinced of something.

Monday, 14th June, 2010

“God save our gracious Queen, Long live our noble Queen, God save the Queen! Send her victorious, Happy and glorious, Long to reign over us, God save the Queen!”

The Queen’s birthday public holiday was here, many people were off work and going to the city for the day, so we decided to head in and talk about the King of Kings.

Jeremy, Blake (with voice back) and I caught the train into Central. Shortly after getting on the train we noticed a couple of men hop on also. One of them had the biggest crucifix you have ever seen and he was reading Augustine. We picked them as being from the local Catholic seminary so we got a Catholic tract out ready for them. A few stations later when they got off Blake handed it to them. They have read it and since sent an angry email. Please pray for them.

As we were coming into central station I thought it would be a good idea to preach for about 90 seconds between stations. So I stood up and began to share the gospel. At the mention of Jesus one man stormed out of the carriage into another, but the rest of the people listened and many took tracts afterwards. One man even walked up and shook my hand at the end of the preaching.

By now we were at central station, so we made our way into the city centre. As we approached King George Square we ran across a lady (we think) sitting on a chair with a sign sprouting how we aren’t to think but feel (I wonder if she used thought to write the sign). I questioned her a bit on her belief, she didn’t have many answers and in the end she promised to read a tract. Please keep her in prayer.

After this we went and preached on Elizabeth street. Jeremy was the preacher and he did some good preaching. It was good to see him get up and preach again. He is quite a gifted speaker, may God use him for His glory.

Saturday, 12 June, 2010

Posted 22 June 2010, 4:13 PM by Ryan Hemelaar. Permalink

The Gold Coast team usually meets from 12pm-3pm each Saturday, but today we decided to push the start and finish times one hour earlier. The reason for this was that two people who join us on the streets occasionally at the Gold Coast were getting married today - Dan & Simonie. Congratulations to them both!

So at the earlier start time, we had Blake, Bekk and I who met together. After a time of prayer, we read from Ephesians 1. Since it was earlier in the day, there were not as many people about. However, soon after starting to hand out tracts, two performers decided to do some antics in our usual preaching area. This drew a small crowd of onlookers, and so we were able to hand tracts out to the crowd.

I thought I would take the opportunity of the gathered crowd to preach, so once the performers were gone, I stood up to preach. I started off by talking about the soccer World Cup that was coming up. Many people have been counting down to it for years. Some have bought flags, their team's fan gear, plane tickets to see the matches and so on. The broadcaster who won the rights to show the Wolrd Cup on US TV screens had to pay 400 million dollars for it. Yet while the World Cup is a massively-popular event, there are some people in the world who haven't been looking forward to it. And some may not even know that there is such an event. But there is an event coming up that no one will miss. A day bigger than the World Cup, that every one will know about it when it arrives. And that is the return of Jesus. I then went on to speaking about the Judgement that will occur at Jesus' return, the fact that we have all sinned and deserve Hell, and that Jesus died on the cross for all those who would repent and believe.

At about miiday, Rick and Glenda arrived, along with Emma. This was Emma's first time out on the streets after only becoming a Christian not too many months ago. She did a great job for a first timer.

One conversation that Bekk and I was with two young ladies. When I asked them that if they were to die tonight would they go to Heaven, one responded by saying, "No, our souls will sleep until the return of Jesus. Then we'll go to Heaven." By their answer I could tell that they would either be Jehovah's Witnesses or 7th Day Adventists. They were 7th Day Adventists. They had no qualms in admitting that they live in sin and have no interest in turning from that sin. For they said that God does not mind them living that way, for God will let them into Heaven anyway.

So I warned them that Jesus said a person must repent to be saved. They responded by saying that even though they are 7th Day Adventists, they are not born again. They said they plan on doing that later in life, and the way that happens is by water baptism. We pointed to them John 3 where Jesus says that unless a person is born again, they will not enter the kingdom of God. Being born again is not an optional extra, it is required. We then corrected their misunderstanding about what they think being born again is. It is not water baptism, it is something spiritual - where a person dies to their old self and comes to be alive in Christ and they receive the Holy Spirit.

But they wouldn't have a bar of it. They expressed clearly that they had no intention of turning from their sin, and yet thought they would still enter Heaven. All we could do is warn them again about what the Bible teaches - that a person must repent and trust not in their baptism to enter Heaven or any other good work, but only the death of Jesus for their forgiveness.

Blake at this point in time was talking to two Jewish guys, and as the conversation progressed, the amount of people listening to his conversation increased. So he eventually had a crowd of people surrounding him listening in. Blake mentioned that some of them after hearing the gospel were very convicted.

Since I preached earlier in the day, there hadn't been a preacher up for a little bit. So Rick decided to get up on the block and doing some preaching. He did a great job in proclaming the awesome truth about Christ paying for the sins of His people.

During this time, Glenda got in a great witnessing encounter with a man who was riding a bike. She said the conversation went for about an hour and the man was very challenged and was soaking in everything she said. Praise God!

To God be the glory!

Friday, 4 June, 2010

Posted 20 June 2010, 10:39 PM by Rob Hughes. Permalink

Friday night saw a great team turn-out, which was really encouraging. Along with myself the team comprised of Barney, Beth, Laurence, Rebekka, Sohail, Michael Prendergast, Michael Powell, and Philip and Suzanne – totalling 10 evangelists. Both Michael’s, and Philip and Suzanne, met us when we arrived in the Square.

I decided to preach first and began by commenting on how great a day it had been weather wise. I encouraged people to agree with me that the day had indeed been a fabulous day. I then appealed to people’s world-views and asked them what they thought of the world. To what do they attribute the beauty that we see? Do they put it down to the handiwork of an awesome Creator, or is the beauty we see simply the result of a cosmic accident? I laid a solid case for a Creator and then went straight to the Scriptures and pointed out how the Bible provides us with a framework from which we can understand and make sense of the world. The Bible is a book that makes perfect sense in light of all we see and experience in the world, and although the heart of man is closed to it, God’s Word brings hope and redemption for all who receive its message, but condemnation and judgement for all who reject it.

After I finished a number of conversations began through the aid of the preaching. Barney in particular has become quite good at spotting those who stop to listen and then engaging in conversation with them. It is a sure testament to the importance and value of open-air preaching. As I was getting ready to approach some people a chap I have spoken to a number of times before came up to speak to me. He believes strongly in the theory of evolution and has concluded that there is no God and that science is able to explain our existence and all of human experience. We became locked in conversation and began to debate at quite a pace. While it was good that I did speak to him I have realised that I made a number of mistakes in this conversation. Firstly, I spent far too much time with him. He had an “arsenal” of objections and “facts” that he believed proved evolution and no sooner would I tackle one that he would bring up another. Had I left the conversation earlier I could have spoken with a number of other people that were more open to hearing the Gospel and the Word of God. It was a lesson learnt and a mistake I hope not to repeat again. I do believe the enemy had an arm in this and that being distracted in this way is a tactic he uses often! We must be on our guard and recognise when we are in situations like these.

While I was engaged in conversation Andrew stood up to preach. I was not able to hear all that he said but it was clear and he preached faithfully the Gospel and he declared to all who would hear the full counsel of God.

The following was written by Laurence and describes the conversations that he had: “Last night I ended up talking to two sets of Catholics; the first two were two young ladies the other two were a couple. I found myself led on both occasions to ask them whether they have ever fully repented.  Both times two people honestly declared that they hadn't; once I explained what genuine repentance was. Especially one of the young ladies seemed incredibly honest about her struggles in understanding God and accepting that Jesus can forgive her of her sins; she said she understood that Grace is a gift, and that we cannot please God by 'good' works. Although she said she knew God she didn't suggest that she ever really submitted her life to God in repentance, she could see what was missing in own her confession of knowing God. There's one thing knowing the Gospel and what the Bible says, and even believing it is true. It is another to respond by faith and repentance in full submission to the Master of heaven and earth.”

Praise the Lord for using once again to declare His message to the people of London.

Soli Deo Gloria!

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