Battle Log

• Battle Log
• Warwick (QLD) Team
• Page 2

---

Warwick Team (QLD)

Meets each Friday 11am to 2pm - we set up a free Bibles table on the main street of Warwick.

Contact Rick Barnard for more information.

---

Every week is just as good as the last because when its God's work it's always good.

The one that was most memorable was a man I have talked with before. He was walking past and looked at the tract said um no, then he turned back and said oh ,ok I'll take it. Then a while later he was walking back and stopped. At first I hadn't remembered what he had believed and I said I know your face and we've chatted before and he said yes I'm an atheist. I got his name again and we chatted.

It was good he said that he wants to be a person that keeps learning, so he wants to be teachable. He talked about the climate change and said I would not agree with him. But on what he was saying I did agree with him that we have a responsibility to care for the earth God has given us. But again went to the fallen state of the world talked about Adam and Eve the consequences of sin, our broken relationship and the curse of sin on humankind and creation. I remember this man from last time and God is really doing a stirring work in his heart. He was challenged again about the truth of the Bible message.

Pray or him and all those we have had the privilege to share the truth in love.  Again we continue to have other Christians stop to encourage us and we are able to encourage them as well. All praise honour and Glory to our Sovereign triune God.

---

Last week a young girl came up and asked for a Bible. It is always so wonderful to have people wanting to receive a Bible. Also its great to be able to ask some questions and encourage them in the Gospel. God is doing all of the work in the heart. We are just like a sign post pointing to the salvation message that we have joyfully received by God's Mercy and Grace. It's all for His purposes and Glory.

When asked if the Bible was for herself, she told me she had read and studied it in the past and that she wanted to investigate it more. I shared the most important message is to be made right with God. To have God's Spirit and a new heart. First we need to hear the bad news and Gods Word and work is needed to admit we are sinners in great need for God's Grace (I like to use the song  “Amazing Grace”) and talk about how it says a wretch like me ... and how blind sin makes us. Then when we see our problem it helps us. God’s grace gives us ears to hear the sound of God’s call and to see our greatest need as He opens the heart to believe and appreciate the good news of Jesus!!!

She was asked some questions, we talked about the condition each person is in because of our sin. There is nothing we can do because we are spiritually dead only Jesus can save us. I wrote down some Scriptures gave her a couple of tracts and asked her to read them and if she needed any help that we are here on Fridays. She had to go, it was a wonderful conversation.

Rick listened and talked to a man who had been through some not very nice things, poor man is also new in town.  We were able to give him information where he could get help with food if he needed to. He was taken through the flip chart and given tracts. He was admitting his sin and heard the message of salvation as a gift not works. 

We had a few young kids with parents take tracts this last couple of weeks of school holidays. Sometimes the parents take the tract read a few lines then pass it to their child.

We were giving out the tract "The intelligence test" also other tracts and booklets continue to be handed out praise God.

---

With everything that is happening in the media and God's Word being attacked we are not surprised at all. The battle for truth is real. We know that the Gospel needs to be proclaimed and God's Word is the instruction manual to life not only for the short time here on earth but most importantly for Eternal life.

Without faith in the righteousness of Jesus we face God's just punishment in hell for eternity. Those who have been given a way of escape through the perfect work of Jesus are by faith in Jesus made righteous. Out of great love from God we then love Him and are thankful and we love others, God makes an appeal through us towards others to come to Him. We need to humble ourselves in admitting we are sinners in desperate need of God's grace then come into the saving knowledge of Christ Jesus our Lord and all He has done for us. Praise God our Father who draws us by His Spirit and is Sovereign. It is all His work and all Glory belongs to Him now and forever.

At Warwick this last week we saw God doing His work in many ways. People taking tracts and happy to receive them.

The conversations we have are very good and as we share what God's Word says we know that seeds are planted.

A lady stopped and was supportive of what we are doing. She said if people followed the 10 commandments we would have a better world. She is right in that but we know this would never happen because of sin. No one can keep God's law but God. It was a great opportunity for a good fruitful conversation with her. She was stirred in her heart about life and she had many questions that both Rick and myself were able to answer through what the Bible teaches, and also with some of her questions we admitted to be difficult for us too, but we trust God is good and will always do right.

We explained we trust that God is in control even when we can't fully understand why some things happen the way they do. God's ways are not our ways. He is God we are not. God is always good, kind and compassionate. His ways are always to do a good work in us to bring us and others to salvation. We explained that sin is the issue and we all are separated from God. We focused on her salvation and how important it is for her personally. This lady was so open and teachable, we gave her a booklet " Why is there death and suffering" a Gospel tract and also the booklet of John. She was challenged to read Ephesians 2 and Romans 8 and the book of John to get to know Jesus in repentance and faith. She has a Bible at home. Please pray for J.

God is softening hearts and doing amazing things by His Spirit through us. What a great privilege to be a part of God's ministry.

Another chat happened with a guy who received a gospel tract and as we talked with him he was explaining that his brother-in-law was moderator of a church and had just recently passed away. We asked if he was to die today would God let him into heaven? His reply was all wrapped up in his being a good person and told us about some of the good things he has done in his life. While doing good things for people we said was the right thing to do, and we should do good, we still have a sin problem that must be delt with here on earth, before we die.

We all will stand before our Creator to give an account. Only trust in the perfect work of Jesus to cleanse us from sin and to receive His righteousness will matter on that day. Jesus is who we need most. We had to stress a few times that good works will not get us into heaven and that Jesus is the only way. Please pray for J to read the tract we gave him and that the Holy Spirit would open his eyes to see and believe that salvation is in Christ alone. Thank you for praying to all who do pray, you are a blessing to the kingdom.

All Glory to our great God

---

It’s good to be back in Australia after 4 weeks in America visiting family. We have the privilege to be back and able to continue to share God’s Word on the streets of Warwick through the Operation 513 ministry.

As I started to hand out tracts, a lady approached the table. She was friendly and interested in what I was doing. She had never heard the message of Jesus. As I spoke about the reality of death and Eternity I explained the bad news of us all being sinners. That sin separates us from our creator. Our greatest need is to know and believe in God’s plan to save us from Eternal punishment and to be given Eternal Life, through what Jesus did on the cross. So I talked about the Christmas and Easter message. She said she hoped that was true. I then pointed her to the Bible and how it is God’s Word to lead us to know and have the sure hope by putting her trust in Jesus alone to take away her sins. I gave her the booklet of John and encouraged her to read a little everyday to get to know Jesus. I asked her to let us know how she is doing and any questions or help that we are here on Fridays. Pray for L that she will read the booklet and tracts given to her and come to a saving faith in Jesus Christ our Lord.

Pray for a young lady C who took a Bible. I didn’t have enough time to know where she was in her understanding of the Gospel as her partner came and pulled her away. She has tracts and the Bible. 

We had a guy walk past us and I handed him a tract and we started a conversation. He said he grew up in a catholic household but walked away from that and is now following his grandparents religion of Judaism (unfortunately from one set of rule keepers to another). I listened for a good length time and asked him what he now believes about salvation, forgiveness, sin, hell, who Jesus is and other foundational questions but all his answers line up with what he is being taught from his teachers of Judaism and after discussing with him over these issues we gave him a booklet (Jesus is God) and challenged him with the reality of standing before God in judgment if he died in his sins and rejected what Jesus has done for those who believe. Please pray that our Lord will convict M of his unbelief and lead him to salvation.

All glory to our God.

---

Not long after setting up the table, as I began to hand out tracts a man asked what it was. It was "The way to heaven" tract and I told him it was an important message. He refused the tract and turned back at me saying God had killed his wife. I quickly replied that, we all die because of our sin. He kept walking on. I can only trust that this was a planted seed for him to think about.

Then another man commented as he walked passed he said, "It is all a fantasy." My response was, "No, it is true and every knee will bow to Jesus."  He called out, "then I'll find out one day."  It is sad that people are hard in their heart but we know that without God opening our heart to believe in Jesus as our Saviour, we too would also be dead in sin.

A great conversation was had with a man who at first was criticizing Christianity and shared a few things that he though. This brought an opportunity to explain true Christianity and how God has His people in the mist of this world doing good loving acts, helping those who are afflicted and standing for truth. G had some understanding from his early years but just not understanding God's ways in how He is Sovereign over sinful acts and the responsibility we have to obey His call to worship the only true God. The message of repentance and the cross was shared and G went from sceptic to considering God may have sent me to speak with him this day. He at first didn't want a tract but took one in the end and was encouraged to consider God's call for him to believe that Jesus is his eternal solution and his greatest need is to be saved.

Many tracts went out and lots of short but exciting conversation continued to happen.

Rick arrived not long after I needed to leave for 5 minutes, and when I came back I saw Rick in conversation with a lady near a car parked next to the Bible table. I prayed for him and as I got closer noticed that her face was familiar, then it struck me. This was the lady from last week that asked about the gay marriage booklet and had taken a Bible for her son nut wasn't interested for herself. Praise God I had the opportunity to plant a few seeds of truth in love. She had a friendly smile and looked at me and I said "oh Hi I remember you" she said "yes from last week".

I stood back as Rick had an opportunity to spend some time with her and I continued to hand out tracts.Then along comes H, the lady's niece who is pregnant. I said Hi and she was as happy as I was to see each other again. I gave her a tract on abortion that last week I couldn't find. This was because part of our conversation last week was on how God knits together life in the womb which is such beautiful work and how the baby is formed from the start. I gave her the tract and a bookmark and stickers for her baby. Rick had a fruitful conversation with K and she was saying we were loving in our approach. Praise God we can share truth in love with God's help as He uses us to point to Jesus and His perfect love in that He laid down His life to pay for our just penalty of sin so we may have eternal true life with Him. What a wonderful saving God.

They left with tracts and our prayers for them are that God's grace would touch their hearts with the gift of salvation through our Lord Jesus.

3 Bibles went out today 1 New Testament and a book of John.

We had two brothers who were very interested in discussing things of God and the Bible although one was more understanding the Gospel than the other we hope and pray that God's grace may give them a humble heart to receive His grace and be saved from the hell punishment we all deserve.

We will be away for 5 Fridays starting next week so it will be a time people that regularly see us will be wondering what has happened to that nice couple. (Or yay the bible people are gone.) God willing we will be back on the streets of Warwick mid June. Thank you so much for praying.
To God be the Glory.

---

This time of year is nice for being out on the streets of Warwick just before the colder weather starts to creep in and we begin to see the beanies, woolly coats and scarf’s come out of their hiding places which have been put aside since last winter.

The outreach was under way when I arrived after finishing work where I see my wife handing out some tracts to some people passing by the Bible table. Glenda had a chat with a lady and her pregnant niece. The lady approached the bible table and asked if she could have a free bible for her son, she said he’s into this God stuff and is a very intelligent 12 year old. Glenda put a comic tract into the bible and gladly gave it to her.

The lady noticed a AIG booklet “Gay Marriage” and asked Glenda what she personally thought about that subject, in which she said that she believes what the bible teaches about it, and that it is a sin just like lying and stealing are also a sin, and that we all have sinned, that is why Jesus came to rescue us sinners. The lady’s niece said that she liked the verse in the bible John 3:16. Glenda quoted that verse and shortly after the lady left leaving the niece at the table so Glenda got to share some more with the niece.

She was open to the truth of God that He should be and deserves to be first in our life but only by His grace be given understanding of our need of saving. By faith in His Son Jesus to be saved and given Eternal life, she wanted and received a pocket book bible. Before she left she was encouraged to read through the comic tract and was explained that we need to understand the bad news to appreciate the good news of John 3:16 

During the morning four ladies from the same church, not together but at different times walking past stopped to encourage us and let us know that they and the church were praying for this outreach each week. Isn’t it a joy to know that we are being upheld in prayer to our heavenly Father for the furtherance of His Kingdom. Thank you to all who pray for the ministry. Mostly thank the Lord Jesus that He is always with us doing the great work through us and in us.

A guy approached us and said what is this all about? After hearing what we were doing here he started on about how Christian nations were making weapons for war in America and other places in the world. I let him know that just because it is said that these places are called “Christian nations” doesn’t mean that they are Christians. In our conversation I kept on saying that “ true Christianity” are followers of Christ who are called to love our enemies.

He went on to say about climate change and many species of animals dying out of existence and many other topics and that’s when I said that anyone could do a search on the internet to see that from the year 1900 to 2000, a 100 year period, that the temperature change was an increase of just 0.78 of a percent!!!! He didn’t like that at all for he said he is a scientist and he asked if I had any qualifications to make such assumptions, in which I replied, only a rational, reasoning mind to look at the evidence and after some more discussion I said there is a lot more a stake than the here and now, and when asked if he thought he was a Christian in which he said that he thought he was and he used to go to church.

I talked about sin and that if we die in our sin we will stand before God in judgement and be sent to hell. Jesus came to save sinners. He was told a true Christian has had a heart change by God. It seems this man stopped to have a debate and he didn’t want to talk about the bible or true Christianity. Pray for his heart to be softened by God. Thank you for your prayers and support.

---

At Warwick this week we handed out Anzac tracts and had a few conversations. It was very busy because of the Polo Cross Event running all week so many people received tracts.

Rick spoke with a man who thought he was just going into the ground when he dies and he wants to just enjoy what time he has left in this life. After being challenged about the amazing design in creation and our bodies specifically the eye how complex it is in design and how that could just happen without a designer. Rick took R through the law and brought the Gospel to him. He walked away with saying he was thankful for the discussion and would think about what was said. He took a tract with him.

A couple on scooters stopped and I got to speak with the lady and Rick started a conversation with her husband. S was declaring her faith in Jesus and had the Gospel message and was full of thankfulness for Jesus. She was given contact details to a Church close to her as she has not been attending a Church for some time and said she would like to go. Her husband L didn't know the way to heaven and thought his goodness would probably get him there. Rick made sure he understood sin by taking him through some of the commandments to show our guilt and the great need to have our sins forgiven. The Gospel was shared and we pray for this couple, especially for L that he receive the gift of salvation in Christ Jesus.

I got to share the message with a young teenager who didn't know any commandments but said he puts God first every day. After going through the law with him he did admit he was guilty but said his good out weighed his bad. So then it was explained that any good we do doesn't cancel out the bad things we do and we still have broken God's law. There needs to be payment for sins as justice must be upheld and God is a perfect judge. I used the 'Are you a good person' tract to talk about the courtroom analogy. Hell punishment was explained and that we all deserve Gods punishment. Also I shared how Mr nice guy on the front of the tract has a smile on his face, but by the end of the good person test his face is looking very different as he sees that there is no one good enough to enter heaven.

This is how we need to be to understand our greatest need for what God has done to provide a way of escape. God sent His Son Jesus to live a perfect life in our place. I explained and asked C questions about the Easter message and he did answer a few things correctly. Pray that the Gospel will open C heart to salvation and God's Spirit do the work needed in his life.

Thank you so much for praying.
All Glory to God!

---

It has already been 1 year since we began the work of evangelism at Warwick, praise God!

All Glory to God for the opportunities that He continues to bring each week. So many tracts have gone out and each and every conversation has been God's Providence and we rejoice knowing that it all will be used by our merciful loving Holy God.

This week a Christian brother we have had the privilege to build a friendship with his Granddaughter. While he was in conversation with Rick, I heard her saying "it didn't turn orange!!!" Trying to get their attention she kept looking at it wondering why the good person test was not giving her a pass. I was not far away and had been talking with a lady from our church who had stopped by to see how we were going. I said to this young girl that no one will pass the test. This led into a time of sharing the bad news talking about the commandments in which she knew a few and admitted to breaking them. I explained the courtroom analogy. The Gospel was shared using Easter and Christmas to explain the love of God in providing a way to be saved from hell punishment.

The lady from our church was listening in and I pray that she will be encouraged to use Gospel tracts to start off conversations with people where ever she goes. Pray for this young girl as her Granddad follows Jesus she will see her great need to have her sins forgiven to be able to have a right relationship with our Creator God Jesus. It's all His work as we share the good news.

All praise and Glory to Jesus.

---

Praise be to our Glorious heavenly Father for His continued mercy and grace upon us. He is answering prayer each week as we ask Him to provide opportunities to speak to the people who He brings our way through the streets of Warwick and to prepare their hearts to receive planted seeds from His word. We pray that He will grow these planted truths into a saving harvest.

A young guy happened to pass by the bible table and was handed a tract and he asked what it was, so explaining that it was a gospel tract which asked, "are you a good person?", he said that he thought he was. "Would you be good enough to go to Heaven?" he said he hoped so. We explained the bad news firstly and he said that he didn’t want to go to hell. We shared the good news that Jesus offers us forgiveness for our sins which he paid for when he willingly laid down His life for us on the cross. We need to trust in Him and so we challenged him that there was nothing more important than knowing where we would spend Eternity and to get right with God, for we don’t know if we will have tomorrow. Please pray for M that he will respond to the Gospel and that our Lord draws him unto salvation.

Another chat with a guy who had already been witnessed to in Brisbane came up and started talking with us. He was a friendly guy and very talkative but trying at many times and from different ways to get him to answer questions and pin him down about what he believed would happen after he died proved very difficult. After some time talking to him he had to go. Please pray for (I) that the Lord would convict him of his sin and bring him to salvation.

We are thankful to God in all He is doing.

All glory be to Him.

Rick and Glenda  

---

Today we were thankful to God for bringing back some people we have previously witnessed to.

One was from two months ago and the other 2 weeks ago. Firstly a man from 2 months ago who spoke with us about becoming a full-time carer for his niece. He told us she is a Christian and she would like a bible. The bibles we had were not suitable because of small print so we offered to get a bible with larger print for her. P told us he would come pick it up next time he was in town. He has since found he can not continue his caring role. We were able to give the bible to him to pass on to his niece. We have shared the gospel with him and are hopeful that God will use this to draw him to salvation as we shared that Jesus is our greatest need. We hope to see him again. Pray for both this man and his niece, for God to provide all her needs as she moves back to Brisbane and their salvation. 

Then from 2 weeks ago a husband searching for help for his wife for fellowship. He approached us with a question to where is a good Church for his wife.  I had referred him to our church as it was the closest for them to travel. Today we got to meet his wife. She told me a few things that are going on in her life. I was able to encourage her in the Lord. She said they had driven past our church and will attend this week. Both attended our church on Sunday.  

Rick had a good conversation with a man who was pretty open to questions about Eternity and has planted seeds of truth for him to consider. 

One conversation I had was with a man who had been Seventh Day Adventist, I was able to share about the lady from the other week who had been excommunicated from that religion and through being treated so badly it lead her to look more deeply into God’s Word. She had found out the truth of salvation and knows that it is not by keeping the law. Rather, we are saved but by grace we are saved through faith in Jesus. which is a gift from God. Then we follow in obedience because of thankfulness to God, empowered by God’s Spirit given to all believers to serve and obey because Jesus first loved us!

S was similar in his experience and could see that the religion of SDA is all about rule keeping.The Gospel was shared and tracts given to him just before his mate pulled him away. So we pray for grace to be poured into his life.

Many tracts were handed out. It is a good spot we have and God always has plenty of opportunities for us to have little words spoken as we hand them out. Such as “This is such an important message” or sometimes just saying “Hi, this is for you” makes them reach out to take a tract. Praise God that even through reading the Gospel on these little tracts, He can do such a big work in hearts. Thank you for praying.

---

« Prev | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | Next »

---