Battle Log

• Battle Log
• Page 82

West Country (UK) Team

Newquay Evangelism: Atheism and the Gospel

It was an absolutely gorgeous summer’s day in Newquay; as a result the high street was jammed full of people who were out enjoying the sun. Upon arrival we found a nice spot for today’s outreach; as George and I set up the open-air board and literature table, Nigel and Ian began to hand out tracts. It was encouraging to see people take the printed page in order to read of salvation in Christ alone.

Once the open-air board was set up George began to preach. As he spoke a young woman walked past and yelled out, “I am gay. God hates me!” George replied by pointing her to the love of Christ, but the woman kept walking. What appeared to be a ‘drive-by’ comment would actually be a hook that drew this young lady back to the discussion later on.

George continued to preach for several minutes and then the young woman returned with her friend. She began to heckle, but she was one of those hecklers who would say her comment then let the preacher respond. George did an excellent job in reasoning with her and pointing her to Christ. By the end of the open-air she seemed to have softened considerably.

Of course heckling begets heckling; now that a young woman started the ball rolling the big burly men decided it was their time to jump in. My role was to engage these hecklers one to one as George continued to reason with the young lady. The first man I spoke to claimed to work in the science field, but it was clear he didn’t have an understanding of basic scientific principles. His main objections centred around the question of evolution and also the philosophical question of “Where did God come from?” I answered those questions then brought it around to the biblical message of salvation; whenever we got to the issue of sin and the gospel the man would engage in mockery.

His claim was that sin didn’t exist and that the world is good; keep in mind that he said this while wearing all the safety equipment to protect him from COVID-19. I used his face-covering as an illustration showing that the world is corrupted due to sin; but he he kept on rejecting the message. Finally, I encouraged him to simply go home and watch the news, then as he watches the reports about murder, violence, war and chaos sit back and say, “This world is good; there is no sin here.” The point was made, but his response was to scoff and walk away.

The next heckler I spoke to could have almost been reading from the same playbook, he too claimed to work in science and his main objections centred around evolution and where did God come from. I said to this man, “To ask, ‘where does God come from’ would be like me saying, ‘the Sun gives light, but who lights the sun?’” The man laughed at this and said, “The sun just is!” I smiled and replied, “And God just is. He is outside of time, space and matter; He is the uncaused cause of all things.”

The man then began to engage in the infinite regress fallacy, which I was able to answer; so finally he said, “Prove to me that God exists!” I pointed to one of the buildings which lined the high street and asked, “How do you know that building had a builder?” The man answered, “Because it is there. It is tangible.” I followed up by pointing to a painting in a shop window, “How do you know that painting had a painter?” The man replied again by saying, “Because it is there. It is tangible.”

I then asked him if it would be idiotic to say that tangible things, such as the building and painter, had no painter or builder?” He agreed it would be; so I asked, “You are tangible, as is the world and all created things. How do we know that you and all things have a Creator?” The man paused as he saw the trap that he was in - slowly he replied, “We just happened.”

My point had been made so he was quick to change topics; he began to argue that he knew for sure that the Bible was in error since it is full of contradictions; I asked for just one contradiction but he couldn’t produce it. Finally I said to him, “Jesus tells me why you are an atheist. You love your sin, and you hate the light. You won’t acknowledge God, even though you know He is real, because the moment you do you have to accept the fact that you are accountable to Him.” At this the man mocked and walked away saying, “This is getting too freaky.”

Truly the Psalmist spoke the truth when he said, “The fool has said in his heart, ‘There is no God.’ They are corrupt, They have done abominable works, There is none who does good.” (Psalm 14:1)

By this stage George had finished preaching so the hecklers disappeared back into the crowds of people. After letting the crowd move and change, I decided it was time for me to preach. Today I thought it would be good to use my flip-chart as a tool to assist in the open-air.

As I began to speak a few people began to gather to listen; I particularly enjoyed seeing a man leaning out of a pub window in order to hear the gospel. I used the flip-chart to explain that none of us are good people, and that we all need the Saviour. I had a few people make comments, but unlike George I didn’t have any good hecklers.

I am so thankful that the Lord allowed the gospel to go out clearly today in Newquay via tracts, one to one witnessing and open-air preaching. My prayer is that the Father would draw many to Jesus through these outreaches.

SDG!

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Christchurch (NZ) Team

Tuesday and Wednesday ended up being days where I feel like I spoke to a lot more “Christians” than usual.  And yes, I used double quotes there.  Some of those I talked to were clearly not a Christian, yet with others it was unclear.

I’m glancing through my notes from my time online on Tuesday and the last three conversations were with people saying they were Christian.  I can’t remember it, but my notes say the first guy didn’t know the gospel.  I remember the last one, it was with a guy who said he was a Christian, but only from a cultural perspective - he pretty much denied that God existed.

The middle conversation was long and good.  The guy had a reasonable understanding of important concepts, yet some of the wording he used made me suspicious he was trusting in his works and not faith alone in Jesus dying on the cross to pay his hell fine.  We got to talk that through.  The guy was really appreciative of the conversation; I encouraged him to get out there and start sharing the good news with others.

After this, the outreach in Riccarton was busy.  In two hours I was able to have gospel interaction with 14 people!

One of the homeless guys Andy and I are getting to know was able to articulate the gospel, even frequents a local church.  Yet when I challenged him on the change that comes with faith in Christ, he quickly backed away.  He clearly doesn’t understand the wonder of the gospel… yet.

I spoke to two groups of boarders from Christchurch Boys High School.  They heard the gospel, but there was no interest - sadly.  One of those kids stands out the most in my memory.  He was the most resistant, but he was the quickest to grasp the gospel.

I had a timely conversation with a “Christian” who initially claimed good deeds would get him to heaven, but with some gentle prodding was able to explain the true way to heaven: Jesus.  It turned pastoral, and something triggered me to be straight with him, I asked what sin he was struggling with.  He looked dejected, and asked if he could marry an unbeliever, using 2 Corinthians 6:14 I was able to encourage him that it would be a disaster if he did.  Interestingly, his father had given him the same advice.  The cost of following Jesus is great.  Only with God’s help can we do it.

My final conversation of the outreach was with one of the Unicef street workers.  She is a “Christian”, even going to a local church and we have mutual friends, and yet, she couldn’t articulate the gospel, again defaulting to good deeds - “following the commandments”.

On Wednesday I started at the northern end of Cathedral Square.  Not many people around, yet I was able to have four conversations in short order.  My first was with a “Christian” who said his goodness would get him to heaven!  With some prompting he was able to give a better answer, yet he insisted that we had to “try”.  Sadly, he had to go before we were really able to unpack it.

Next up I talked to a very open hearted man who knew he wasn’t good and deserved hell, and came to understand the gospel, he said he would trust Jesus died for his sins today.  I then talked to a young lady who came to grasp the gospel.

Finally, I encountered a Christian couple with their son.  Their son wanted to answer my question… “you have to follow the ten commandments”. NOOOOO!  His Dad knew better and said “you have to be born again”.  So I asked, “how does that happen?”  We quickly got to the right answer, and I was able to point their son to it!

I decided to head down to Ara to finish the outreach there.  Straight away I was into yet another conversation with a “Christian”.  After going through the gospel with him, I asked when he last read his Bible, and what Church he was attending - he asked me if I had recommendations.  I told him to get in touch with me, yet I doubt I will hear from him.

I finished up with a bit of an apologetical tussle with a friendly young student - he heard the law and the gospel.

To finish the day, I spent two hours online, and had seven conversations - many of them wonderful.  The highlight was with some black lives that matter.  They warmed up to the conversation and heard the law and the gospel.  I challenged them to respond, but they said they already were.  So I asked them what they said they had to do to go to heaven at the start of the conversation - “be good”.  They could see that they weren’t trusting that Jesus had died for their sin.  They were very challenged.

Christians, we have to get back to basics.  Tell me, what do you have to do to go to heaven?  The answer is NOT, “be a good person”.  But what is the answer?  You need to understand this.  You need to understand the gospel and respond to it if you haven’t already.
 

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Toowong (QLD) Team

Operation 513 Battle Log for Toowong Village on Tuesday July 28, 2020 from 1330 - 1500

We were over joy to have Yan Chang from Toowong Baptist joining us through invitation of Johnny. Naturally she partnered with Johnny to observe and learn how to do street evangelism partly by our skill but mainly by the power of God through the work of the Holy Spirit in us to stop the right person at the right moment sowing the seed of Gospel. God repeated His trick like last week testing our faith and patience to wait before him. Despite we have opening prayer every time before we started as a team, this time , God let no one stop for a chat for the initial 15-20min. It was OK for Johnny and Yan as Johnny was taking the time to teach Yan. But for us, we knew we have to initiate a second tier of prayer. So Winnie took up to pray for divine appointments. And really soon after that, both Winnie and me as a team and Johnny and Yan as another team started having gospel sharing opportunities. Johnny had four long chats while Winnie had Eight chats reaching out to 10 people as shared below in Chinese with my English translation.

As for me, I still played an inactive role only getting overflow gospel targets if everyone else were engaged in gospel conversation. As a result I only had four short conversations as recap below.

1) Esther an UQ student from Venezuela. She took the tract from Winnie but walk on. So I asked if I can walk with her for a while to share about the tract which she agreed. After a while, She declared she is a Christian but failed the diagnosis test having no assurance of salvation. So even though she was in a hurry, I was able to get her understand our salvation was the work of Christ and Christ alone that we only need to accept it by grace through faith. She acknowledged it with thanks and went home with peace in her mind.

2) Daniel, a local Aussie from NSW, again took a tract from Winnie but did not stop. So I asked for his permission to share the gospel with him and he politely stopped for a while. So, basically he is a non-believer and heard the Gospel for the first time. He found it sensible and logical to admit he is a sinner despite also a good person and he needs Jesus to take his place for the punishment of sin. He promise to pursue God when he get back to NSW. He is a mechanic but caught locked up here in Queensland because of the Covic -19 .

3) I Followed up with a Singapore girl whom Winnie had approached. She is a Catholic background Christian who has noa assurance of salvation. SO I help her to know that she is saved by grace through faith in Christ alone so as to help her to establish 100% assurance of salvation in Christ.

4) A local Aussie men in black graciously took my tract and happy to listen to my gospel sharing. It was a pity I only had time enough for the nutshell of gospel before the bus came. Trust in God anyway for follow up work.

感謝讚美主 今天的帶领。我們到達傳福音的地點後，等了15 分鐘，都沒有人願意接受單章及留下聽福音。關牧師叫我禱告，求主带領。跟着很多人都願意留下聽，及回教會。

第一及第二位是中國來，UQ 學生。Fay 和Lisa。Lisa 是上海來的。他們都是未聞福音，聽完了我講的，接受免费禮物，願意到教會尋求更多真理。 The first and second are UQ students Fay and Lisa from Shanghai. They heard the gospel for the first time and were willing to go to church near by in St Lucia.

第三位是一天主教背景的澳洲農村婦女,自以為得救但未全明白救恩、The third is a Country woman of Catholic background. She did not want to chat but took the tract and read it right away while waiting for her friend's call. Afterwards Winnie was able to have a brief chat to found out she is already a Christian but obviously not have full understanding of Salvation.

第四位，中國少女，講了一半，巴士到來。The 4th was a Chinese lady, the bus came when I only shared half of the gospel.

第五位，George, 也是中國學生，基督徒。經過我們談論救恩後，他是完全明白，得救的基督徒。The 5th was George also an UQ student from China. After chatting, I found him a doctrinally sound Christian having correct understanding of salvation.

第六位是 Danny, 澳門來的。也是第一次聽福音。祂聽完後，願意回教會，尋求更多的真理，才能決定。The 6th was an UQ student from Macau. He listened to the gospel for the first time. Afterwards, he was willing to accept Christ and wanted to go to church.

第七位是 Singapore 來的 天主教徒，我説 基督教是信靠主耶穌基督，在十字架上的救赎，只要信靠，罪得赦免。不是靠Maria 及神父。後來 關牧師也同她談論救恩，相信祂一定明白了。The 7th was an UQ student from Singapore of Catholic background.

第八 & 九位是 印度夫妻, 男本婉拒但妻願聽。The 8th and 9the were an Indian Couples, the man initially declined but the wife wanted to hear the gospel. Praise the Lord.

第十位澳洲年老人，Morris, 他也是第一次聽聞福音，願意接受免費救恩，罪得赦免，願意回敎會。The 8th was a local Aussie elderly man. He was glad to be approached and heard the gospel for the first time but also showed willingness to accept Christ and want to go to church.

感謝主的帶领，祂是聽禱告的神。

Thanks God for His guidance and listening to our prayers for bringing above people to us to hear the gospel and to accept Christ or expressed desire to pursue knowing more about Christ.

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West Country (UK) Team

On Saturday Simon and I drove up in wet conditions to Exeter, praying the forecast was right that it would clear up after lunch. We were hopeful of another good day of outreach in Exeter which has a smaller population than Plymouth but the City Centre is moe condensed and so always has great numbers of people flowing through. Immediately as we were setting up a man and his wife stopped to look at the intelligence test, and after asking what the purpose of us being here was we explained we were Christians and what we were planning to do that day. This led into quite a heated discussion as he was an an 'agnostic'  and said that no one can know if God exists or not, and that Science proved how we got here. His wife had been brought up in a strict Jehovah's Witness family that she had come out of, and so both of them were trying to attack the Christian worldview from different angles. We tried to show how Protestant Christianity and the teachings the JW's believed were very different, and the husband claimed we were very arrogant in saying we knew God existed and that Christianity was the right religion as it was the only one where people could have their sins completely forgiven. 

They did not want to listen much and kept changing the topic and bringing up supposed new reasons why we were wrong, and didn't want to take any literature to read, and so was an interesting first start to the day! We prayed for the weather to clear up, for good conversations, for boldness to speak the truth and to be protected against the authorities and God was very gracious in answering our prayers. I also said to Simon it would be good if a big group of teenagers wanted to do the good person test to try the new board out, and again God kindly answered our prayers......

First of all Simon and I handed out tracts for about 30 minutes, and two young boys aged about 14yr old boys were up for doing the good person test. It worked really well as it was big, bold and bright, and they listened intently as I tried to show them the links between Christmas and Easter. They took some gospel tracts and said they would read them and think about what was said.

After a few more conversations with different passers byd people stopping to look at the signs, four older teenagers with masks on (as seen in Picture) came along to look at the intelligence test board and find out what we were doing. It turned out their names were Jake, Javier, Reece, Kieran. They lived near London, were staying in Cornwall with friends but had come up to Exeter for the day to shop.great questions and insights. They all listened very eagerly to everything that was said about the law, sin, judgment, hell, Gods grace, Jesus and the cross, repentance and faith, and started to ask many very deep and insightful questions. They were all aged around 17/ 18, and Javier (second on left) in particular as asking questions that a lot of Christians perhaps have never thought about, regarding homosexuality, creation, evolution, Gods attributes and heaven and hell. 

I managed top share my testimony and the reason we were out that day from Plymouth is because we cared for people and even though we knew we defiantly deserved Hell and were not good people, by Gods grace we had been saved and forgiven and so were not getting the justice we deserved but Gods mercy, and that God loved them and wanted them to be reconciled to Him that day! I got quite emotional at one point and I hope they saw we were not any better than them, but just better off, and they all took lots of tracts and took pictures of the signs and websites and said they would all definitely be thinking about all that was shared today in our 30 minute or so conversation.

At 2.30pm a lady called Sandra met with us who lived in Exeter. She and I have just joined a Christian ministry called Centre for Bioethical Reform as a pro life volunteer to hopefully do silent demonstrations with big signs in .Bristol and hopefully Exeter and Plymouth, as well as training we had undertaken to defend the Pro-Life viewpoint from a Biblical and Scientific point of view. I have really felt strongly about doing more and have seen this as a good opportunity to meet with other Christians to stand for the unborn and help teach and train other Christians and use their resources as well as Living Waters '180' movie and Christian Institute facts and data to change peoples mind and lead into sharing the gospel with them.

Sheila came to listen to what we were doing and prayed with some people that came to chat who were Christians. Another group of four teenagers came along to see what the good person test was about, and a really strange thing occurred while I was sharing the gospel and how short life was and we didn't know when our date of death would be. While speaking with them, completely out of the blue, one of the teenagers suddenly went rigid like a pole, fell down and bumped his head on the floor. We were all very shocked and after a few seconds he came to, stunned and not really knowing what had happened. We sat him down and asked if he had epilepsy, if he was on any medication, if he had taken drink or drugs that day, to which he answered no to everything. It had never happened before, and although he didn't want to contact his parents his three friends said they would make sure he got home safely. It was very surreal, especially in light of the topics we had just been talking about, and I hope it served as a sharp reminder to them about the fragility of life!

A Muslim couple came up and had a long chat with me and Simon about various topics, the man in particular about Jesus not being God as he didn't know when he would be retuning in judgment, and so therefore he could not be God. We both tried to reason with him about Jesus submitting to the Father and giving up his rights in servitude to the Fathers will, becoming a man whilst still being God, but the man kept trying to go round in circles. In the mean time two teenage girls from Plymouth came along wanting to take the good person test, and so I stood up on the bench to preach through the sheets with them and hope other people would also stop to listen. The Muslim woman came to listen to me and went through the questions with the two girls, and kept asking other questions as we were going through them, but we just about managed to stay on course and the Muslim woman was civil and respectful. They both took som tracts in th end after staying for about 20 minutes to speak, and she had stayed to hlp when the lad head the seizure and was civil and friendly.

Simon had also been speaking to four teenage girls that had stopped while I was standing to preach, and their main issue with Christianity was homosexuality again, which Simon tried to show them that homosexuality wa sone of many sins, and that people were sinners regardless of their sexual orientation, and we all needed forgiveness and any sin could be completely forgiven by God.

Sheila stayed with us to the end, and after 5 hours all together we went home very tired but overjoyed at all that had happened that day, and prayed for the lads we had spoken to in particular, and God met with us in so many more ways than we could have expected with the many events that had happened that day. We just pray Plymouth and Torpoint where we go to Church would be that open and responsive to the gospel when we go out again!

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Christchurch (NZ) Team

Nice sunshine in Christchurch over the weekend.  It was nice to be back in the city on Saturday.

I set up near the bridge of remembrance and had a lovely time greeting people, handing out tracts, and getting into conversations!

Three highlights:

• An older atheistic gentleman stopped to watch the busker performing next to me, and we fell into a lovely chat where he heard the arguments of the other side for a change.  It was encouraging watching him consume the information I was giving him.
• An elderly couple who had Christian relatives, but were deeply resistant to the gospel.  At one point, the lady admitted that she wanted to live her life her way - she wanted to follow her own truth - she would be judged by her own standard.  I kept coming back to the front page of the flip chart and pointing out the various people, like Hitler, who followed their own “truth”.  In the face of refuted logic, she doubled down.
• A wonderful conversation with a pro-lifer who had encouraged us while we were taking heat during recent gospel + abortion outreaches.  I was able to explain why people reject reason and embrace absurdity - a deep love for sin.  And why only the gospel is the power of God for salvation.  He went through the flip chart with me.

Later, I decided to head to Cathedral Square and ended up having some interesting walk up gospel conversations there.  The last one was very encouraging - the gospel penny dropped for him, and he said, “oh, that makes sense”.

On Sunday, Andy joined me for a couple of hours of outreach in the city.  Andy doesn’t really use the flip chart or tracts any more.  He has become pretty successful at getting people to stop with a confident question and getting into conversations from there.

My highlight conversation of the afternoon was fascinating.  I was talking to a guy who had become a Christian a couple of years ago, when a girl stopped abruptly in front of the flip chart and just stared at it.  The Christian understood when I shifted my attention to her - he moved on.  She was keen to give the flip chart a go, and was very engaged, so I was able to slow down and take her all the way through all the pages.  She had no religious background and seemed to be a pretty clean slate following the logic through, coming to understand the gospel - the checking questions confirming.  She agreed that she would want to accept the gift of Jesus.  So I moved to the final page, which gets people to consider the cost (in this life) of the gift (eternal life).

She said the man should forsake (her word) his precious backpack to accept the parachute.  I explained that it would be the same for us considering the gospel, we will forsake the precious but wrong things of this life to accept the gift of eternal life found in Jesus.  She didn’t seem to grasp it, so I gave an example.

Now she seemed to understand - and instantly became resistant.  She said, “oh, I don’t want someone else to take my punishment, I’d rather be judged for my own wrongs.” (she had reverted to thinking she would be good enough).  But I re-explained why that wouldn’t work out well.  She then said it wasn’t fair for Jesus to take her punishment - she wouldn’t want to let that happen.  But I used an analogy to explain why that didn’t make sense either.

But there was no swaying her.  She reluctantly accepted a tract - “in case you change your mind” - then left.  I was amazed.  I have no idea what she was thinking, but the cost was obviously too high for her.

Later, Andy and I were in Cathedral Square and she came past.  She beelined away from me and looked at me with disgust. :(

Our job is to share the gospel, it’s God’s job is to convert.  I leave her in His hands.
 

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Christchurch (NZ) Team

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.

 

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Christchurch (NZ) Team

A wonderful couple of days of outreach in Christchurch (NZ).  And I had an exciting opportunity to share the gospel outside my usual routine.

I had just started eating dinner with my family when the doorbell rang.  That doesn’t normally happen, so I went to answer it and it was a guy who wanted to do a survey!  Praise God, no easier way to get a gospel conversation started.  I agreed to do the survey, and his first question was: “what is your occupation?”.  I answered: “I’m an evangelist”.  He responded with, “oh, ok”.  Then he paused and asked, “This is not a question on the survey, but, what is an evangelist?”  I smiled, and responded with, “I tell people about Jesus.”  He then asked, “How do you go about that?”  So I said, “I walk up to people and I ask them ‘excuse me, I’ve got a question for you, it’s a deep question, what do you think happens after life?’”  I then added, “If you know there is a hell, and Jesus made a way for us to go to heaven - it’s the most important thing you can tell anyone.”  He seemed fascinated.

He completed the survey - he was trying to sell insurance.  When he was done, I asked him, “so, what do you think happens afterlife?”  He was glad I had asked, because his curiosity was piqued.  And so I got to share the law and the gospel with him!  Although it was quicker than I like because: a) he was working and needed to move on, and b) it was freezing cold outside!  I had a tract in my wallet and passed it to him - he thanked me.  The whole exchange took no longer than five minutes.  Are you ready to share the gospel at a moment’s notice?

but in your hearts honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect,
- 1 Pe 3:15 ESV

A great way to get prepared is to buy a mini flip chart (NZ or AU) and practice in your family or personal devotion times.  Or try some online evangelism with some strangers, but you’ll need to put in some precautions first, check out how.

Earlier in the day I was in Cathedral Square.  But before I got there, I had a wonderful opportunity to approach a guy on Colombo street who had never really thought about what happens after life, but came to understand why it’s important to do so.  The Building / Builder; Universe / Universe Maker analogy made him smile with understanding and he became engaged to hear the law and the gospel.  He was sharp, and checking questions confirmed he was understanding.

In Cathedral Square I had pretty much non stop opportunities to talk with people.  Three guys who were resistant and doubled down when hearing the Building / Builder; Universe / Universe Maker analogy.  There was a guy who recognised me and said he was half a Christian!  We had a wonderful conversation where it became evident he wasn’t a Christain at all and we wrestled through some logic for what a Christian is and why he should become one.

But the highlight conversation was with a guy who had converted to Buddhism about four weeks ago.  He heard the law and the gospel, and quickly came to grasp it.  He said there was nothing stopping him from trusting Jesus paid his hell fine today - even after I got him to think through the cost, including letting go of Buddhism.  He said he would study the tract I give him (pictured).

After this, I headed home and joined the Aussie team for some online outreach.  I had a string of great conversations:

• 2 Catholics who came to understand the gospel.  One of them had an “ah ha” moment.

 

• A stubborn intellectual - didn’t make any progress.

 

• A lovely lady who was scared I was going to tell her she was going to hell, but came to understand the gospel instead.  There was nothing stopping her from trusting.  I pointed her to the Bible, a local church, and needGod.net.

 

• A young man, very open hearted, I couldn't hear him (he responded by typing), but heard the gospel, and was also pointed to a Bible and a local church.

 

• A guy from LA who had tragically seen his Dad’s suicide! :(  He said there was no way of knowing if there was an after life, and resisted when he heard the logic.  But his real issue was that he didn’t like God.  He said, “If I was God, I wouldn’t have done it this way”.  After hearing him say that, I was pretty direct with him - but he appreciated it.  He heard the gospel.  And he appreciated the conversation - he thanked me, and encouraged me to keep doing what I was doing.

Tuesday I was online before heading to Riccarton.

The highlight conversation online was with a young Catholic guy, sharp, but slow to respond.  He was trusting his good deeds to get him to heaven before the conversation, but now understands that it's only trusting Jesus died on the cross for his sin that gets him to heaven.  "Thank you so much for teaching me this", he said.

In Riccarton, the highlight conversation was with a guy who had become a Christian only a few weeks ago!  It was a very encouraging conversation for me.  Although his language wasn’t precise, it was clear that he understood the gospel, and he was overjoyed about it!  He has a passion for evangelism, so I demonstrated the flip chart to him, which he really enjoyed.  We discussed repentance.  And he talked about the change that had occurred in his life.  We are Facebook friends now, and he said he’d be keen to join me on an outreach sometime - even if he just observes initially.

And you would be welcome to join me on an outreach - any time. :)
 

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Operation 513 Battle Log for Sunnybank on Wednesday July 22, 2020 from 1300-1500

Praise and thanks God for calling Gary to join Johnny and Hung this afternoon at Sunnybank to witness for Christ. Gary made two big sign and showed it near the bus stop to both the passengers getting on and off the bus as well as attracting attention of the ongoing traffic. God definitely will use his such extraordinary acts to impress people that the message we share is utmost importance to their eternal wellbeing.

I still chose to play a less active role because of my cough that I had to keep a distance from people whom I had a chat. In the meantime, Johnny had again numerous and almost nonstop gospel sharing opportunity that he definitely would have lost count of the number. I tried my best to capture all those moments if I was not engaged in another conversation. There were again many signs of God's work leading Johnny and Gary to have very special chat to non-believers as well as to people of other faith. Johnny had a long chat with two persons from Taiwan on working holiday. And they have been quickly grabbed by the Mormon Cute but God helped to stop that two guys and let Johnny had an elaborated apologetic discussion with them, like what he had yesterday with a JHW woman. God is always at work and leads us to do what he has Willed and Planned.

As for me, I had six conversations as recap below: -

1) I followed up with a lady that Gary had approached and gave here the Chinese Tract. She claimed she got the tract before so than I asked what did she learn from the tract. She of course could not explained hence I quickly gave her a nutshell of the gospel before her bus came. ( 另一女士，聼過)

2) Then I carried on to follow up with a Chinese old couple from Guangzhou, China approached by Gary. Lucky that I did that as the husband completely misunderstood Gary thinking Gary warn him about falling branches from the tree. When he knew that Gary was actually sharing gospel with him, he shied away to avoid further chat. But his wife Madam Chen was more opened especially when she found out we are all Cantonese speaking. Again, she claimed to be a Buddhist and she has received similar tract from her Christian friends. I of course would not give up but keep sharing the gospel afresh to an extent she admitted it is clear, sensible and logical to accept. And then the bus came to end our conversation.( 陳, 廣州聽過，未信, 丈夫較僵化 , approached by Gary first)

3) Then God brought another non-believer also from China to stop for a chat. Unlike many other mainlander, she was very opened and receptive to the gospel that she claimed hearing it for the first time. She also admitted she is not perfect as such she also need Jesus to save her. While I was about to post the checking question to help affirming her redemptive faith, two of her friends suddenly turned up and kidnapped her away from me with an very obvious vicious purpose stopping her to have further chat with me. The lady was reluctant to go but still being dragged away. So this seemingly was a typical spiritual warfare attack but I believe God will have the final victory to ransom that lady from the hand of the evil one.(未信者認同接受但被朋友劫走)

4) Winnie a Vietnamese Buddhist stopped willingly to chat. Her initial mindset is to show that all religions are good. She even claimed she believes in God, but actually just Buddha which she reckons as God. But I led her to know that even the Buddha admitted he is imperfect and had sin to be punished unless some perfect one comes to save him. Winnie had no point to disagree and gradually she also was bought in to accept the logicality of the Gospel. I encouraged her to read the tract at home and prayed to God for forgiveness of her sin through accepting Jesus as here personal saviour and Lord.

5) The I caught with Jimmy and tested on his understanding of assurance of salvation I clarified last week. He answered correctly and posted several other questions about Judgement and the 2nd coming of Christ.

6) Finally I came across A Japanese girl who was in a rush to look for something. I nevertheless gave her both the Japanese and English tract. Her mind was pre-occupied by something else, but I still managed to leave the seed of Gospel in her heart.

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Toowong (QLD) Team

Operation 513 Battle Log for Toowong Village on Tuesday July 21 from 1330 -1500

It was not yet another routine battle log. God by grace gave out some surprised divine encounters if not miracles after an initial fruitless dried period of 20 to 30 minutes. It was abnormally strange that we got 100% rejection for all the three of us as such Johnny had to resort to an extra second prayer to ask God for softening hearts and moving some elected ones to stop for a divine encounter. Believe it or not, the curse of complete rejection was lifted right away and both Johnny and Winnie started to have around 5 to 6 significant and fruit bearing conversations.

I chose to play a witnessing and supporting role on the sideline because of my cough not fully healed yet. Thus I myself only had three direct and a few more follow up chats with Johnny and Winnie as a team effort. It more so gave me a wider spiritual eye sight to see how God worked amongst us.

The work of God climaxed at the end. A Israelite Muslim man Jakob was stopped by Johnny as the last person in our 1.5 hour ministry period. He originally would have been missed out as Johnny already signaled us to quit for the day. Winnie was busy in writing her battle log note as such she failed to hear my calling for the day and started another conversation with an Aussie Lady that Johnny had just had a chat. So, Johnny could not but continue to reach out for yet another person that was Jakob. It ended up finding that he is a Jew but professing Islamic faith. Johnny was able to share the full gospel to him stressing the importance of Jesus bringing us the salvation by grace through faith. Their conversation was interrupted by a by stander who inadvertently saw me taking photo of Johnny and Jakob. So when we finally all finished and on our way back to Toowong Village for the closing prayer, Jakob waited to meet us for a clarification, God inspired me to testify to him that his conversation with Johnny was not short of a miracle as Johnny could have missed talking to him by a few seconds if Winnie did not miss my calling out to her to quit for the day. I stressed to Jakob that this was certainly a God led divine appointment and he is the elected one by God to hear the gospel without fail. We do pray that Jakob will be moved to receive Christ in His time.

Recap below are the Divine Conversation of Hung , Johnny and Winnie.

A) Hung’s battle Log

1) Robert a Fiji Man who received the tract from Winnie but did not stop. I volunteer to walk with him towards the shopping centre. It ended up finding out he is a Christian with 100% assurance of salvation.

2) While an English young couples were checking out the map after getting out from the bus , I took the chance to chat to the boy who was not sure about going to heaven as a good person. I barely had enough time to share the nutshell of the Gospel. Yet they the chat was cut short as they have to hurry for an appointment at Toowong Village.

3) Shirley an Aussie girl was polite enough to stop from listening to music on head phone but the bus cut short my sharing with only the tract being handed out to do the job as Will by God.

B) Johnny’s battle Log

1) Johnny had chance to share briefly with two young Aussie girl while they were waiting at the traffic light.

2) Then came the Significant chat with a Korean lady whom Johnny quickly noticed she is a JHW believer as she denied there is hell. The conversation lasted for a long time over 20 to 30 minutes. As that lady attempted to evangelize Johnny to her faith. Johnny anyhow had done his job to share the Gospel and clarify all the doctrinal issues with her.

3) After that, Johnny talked with an Aussie girl who initially showed reluctance to stop. But Johnny still managed to share the full gospel to her who has no religious faith and has not heard gospel before. Trust the seed of Gospel should have been sowed.

4) Then Johnny got another long conversation with an local Aussie who claimed to be a Christian of Pentecostal background but is a heavy smoker. His understanding of the Bible and the full meaning of gospel and salvation is very weak. Johnny again did his job to clarify all the misconception of that man.

5) After that, an Indonesian woman passed by. Johnny followed her to the bus stop and found out at the end she is a Christian attending Stephen Tong’s Church. So her understanding of the biblical doctrine and assurance of salvation are all crystal clear. We could only praise God for this special Christian fellowship with people of other culture.

6) It was then followed by the sharing with the middle aged Aussie Woman I mentioned earlier. She is also a Christian but later when I tried to check out her assurance of salvation, she was not certain at all. My follow up conversation with her resolved this issue.

7) Finally came the sharing with Jakob that panned out to be a minor miracle showing God’s finger prints on this divine encounter.

C) Winnie’s battle log:

感謝讚美主 今天的帶領，雖然很多人不願意留下聽福音，但神 都給我有機會向五人分享神的話語。

1) 第一是伊拉克來的學生，願意信靠主。An UQ student from Iraq who is a Muslim but after sharing was willing to receive Christ.

2) 第二是 Eric, 本地 UQ 學生，曾犯罪，聽了福音後，覺得信靠就可以得永生，罪得赦免，願意信靠主，返 UQ 教會，尋求更多真理。Eric is a local Aussie UQ student admitting having committed many sins and was rejoiced to learn that his sin could be forgiven by accepting Christ. He was willing to attend church to learn about more Biblical Truth.

3) 第三是Lily, 本地天主教徒，她説大家都是信神，沒有分别。我説基督教是三位一體的神。不是信馬利亞，靠神父。耶稣基督為救贖我們的罪，被釘上十字架上。只要我們信衪，我們的罪便得赦免，便得永生。這是免费禮物。她説會尋求更多真理，明白多的。Lily was a local Aussie student of Catholic background who has not assurance of salvation. She promised to pursuit truth for better understanding.

4) 第四是Ella, 得救的基督徒，明白救恩，罪得赦免，每周都参加聚會，每天都禱告。我给她福音單張送给她的朋友。Ella is a fair dinkum Christian with full understanding of salvation. She got some tract from me for her friends.

5) 第五是澳洲女士，基督徒，Johnny 與她談話先，後到我與她談，跟着關牧師也到來。我們三人都分别舆她傾談。關牧師詳细講述得救確據，相信她肯定明白救恩。願神带领今天聽到福音的人士。The 5th was a middle aged Aussie lady who had a chat with Johnny but was not aware by me. She claimed to be a Christian, but when Rev Kwan joined the chat, it was found out that the lady did not have full assurance of salvation which was duly clarified by Rev Kwan.

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Christchurch (NZ) Team

It’s been a long, but very good week.  Writing this report is my last task before a day of rest!

It was raining in Christchurch on Saturday, so I decided to livestream some online gospel conversations instead of heading into the city (although I’m really looking forward to doing a Saturday city outreach again soon).

The conversation that stands out the most from Saturday was the last one.  It was with a young man from Georgia, which is on the east coast of the Black Sea, above Turkey.  It doesn’t cease to amaze me how easy it is to reach people with the gospel through technology!  His parents are Orthodox, but he had clearly rejected it.  Yet he was a sharp thinker, and up for a discussion.

The highlight moment was when he said, “if that’s true, then I can trust in Jesus and then do anything I want”.  I was overjoyed, he was grasping the grace of God!  And yet I was able to explain why we wouldn’t want to “do anything” if we understand what Jesus did for us, and we trust in Him.

On Sunday I had the honour and privilege of being able to preach at the meeting of Grace Baptist Church where I taught on Mark 10:17-31.  Funnily, like the last time I preached, an alarm went off half way through!  Luckily this time it was a security alarm instead of a fire alarm, so I didn’t have to finish off in the open air!

I headed into the city afterwards for a couple of hours of outreach.  I was surprised at how much the preaching in the morning had taken out of me.  So I set up my flip chart, and just concentrated on smiling and handing out tracts.

My first conversation was a hard one.  An older gentleman, a Dawkins devotee, decided to take me on.  He didn’t want to talk, just ram his religion down my throat.  I tried to reason with him, but he was so arrogant and pride filled, that I decided to just listen to him go.  And he really loved the sound of his voice.  I just listened and prayed for him.  I took an opportunity to interrupt him and ask his name and shake his hand.  And then let him continue to lecture me and tell me I need to read everything Dawkins wrote.  Finally he came to a stop, and declared he had won the argument.  I smiled, and he turned to depart, when I asked, “Brian, can I ask you a question?  Have you ever told a lie?”  He admitted he had, and agreed it was wrong.  He admitted to stealing as well.  He hadn’t murdered anyone, but when I said, “Well, Jesus said…”, he started railing again.  I let him say his piece before he finally got bored and moved on.  I said “God bless” as he did.  May the Spirit use the few words of the law that he heard to soften that hard soil.  God willing, he will have other opportunities to hear the gospel.

Soon after that conversation, I had another elderly man walk past, point his stick at me and say, “Protestant Bigotry”.  I said, “God bless you sir.”

I then had a follow up with a regular.  He now knows how to say, “I need to trust that Jesus died on the cross to pay my hell fine”.  Yet it’s clear that he doesn’t fully understand what that means, and so I had the opportunity to continue explaining.  I continue to pray for him regularly.

I had a brief conversation with another elderly man, a Catholic - who heard some of the law, but sadly not any of the gospel.

And I finished the outreach with a brief conversation with two Sikhs.  Sadly, they heard the law, and then shut down the conversation too.

I headed to my car, exhausted.  But not discouraged, because my focus is on the glory of God, and not visible fruit.  God granted me much success today in allowing the opportunities He did.  The results are in His hands.

Thank you, Lord, for saving a wretch like me!

PS, I forgot to take photo's for this report, I hope you enjoy the stagged one! :)
 

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