Battle Log

• Battle Log
• Skypecast
• Page 2

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The evening started off very slowly, with only a trickle of people joining the Skypecast. Additionally, Josh Williamson also had microphone problems so that we couldn't hear him most of the time. However, God is faithful and he brought a flood of people into the room for the final hour of the Skypecast.

Also thankfully, Daniel Kissell (who runs the Australian division of Heartcry Missionary) was able to preach in the Skypecast, about topics such as: the holiness of God, the sinfulness of sin and the great news of the gospel.

I had a discussion with a man who had dabbled in a number of the Abrahamic religions but had come to the conclusion that Jesus came to just teach us how to live a moral life. He liked the concept of God being just, but not just enough to punish sin or his own Son. So I went through God's moral law with him to show him his sinfulness. But the fellow kept trying to contend that if he changes the way he lives, he will get to Heaven. So I explained that there is none who do good, and none who are righteous in the sight of God and so we are deserving of Hell because God is just. And if God let people who just repent into Heaven, He would cease to be just. So that lead straight into the gospel.

But when the man heard about Jesus, he resorted back to "He was a great moral teacher. That is everything he is about." So I used C.S. Lewis' Liar, Lunatic or Lord proposition. Jesus himself left no option for him to just be a great moral teacher; He claimed to be God.

Unfortunately during this time, our Skypecast administrator Janet (who faithfully helps us out each week) dropped out of Skype and couldn't return. So that meant we couldn't drop the fellow down to the listening area in order that we could preach the final gospel message. So I continued the conversation with the man and after a while Josh Williamson managed to log into the host account and drop him down.

Over the course of the evening, many seeds of the gospel went out and there were 457 people who listened in.

We will have another Skypecast at the same time next week - Sunday 9pm - 12am GMT+10. If you would like to advertise the upcoming Operation 513 Skypecasts on your webpage/blog/myspace, please visit the Skypecast page and that will give you the instructions on how you can do so.

To God be the glory!

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As soon as the Skypecast opened up at 9pm, a whole flood of people started joining. There would have been a couple hundred people in the first few minutes. During this time, I preached a clear law and gospel presentation and as soon as I had done that, everyone was randomly kicked from the Skypecast. People tried to rejoin, but it kept kicking everyone out for the next 15 minutes or so.

Once stability had been restored, there were a considerable less amount of in the Skypecast. However, as the evening progressed, the number of listeners kept growing.

We had a Muslim heckler who tried to propose that the Christian God is not just because Jesus takes the punishment of someone else. However, I pointed out that if a fine needs to be paid for, the law is not concerned about how the offender gets the money to pay the fine (whether their parents give money, etc), only that the fine is paid. So in the same way, we have sinned and have a fine to paid (death) and Jesus can pay it for us and thus justice is satisfied. So then the man had to resort to saying, "Well, the Christian God is still not just because the judge is the one who pays the fine, that is a conflict of interest." I responded by saying that the reason why in some countries we have laws such as 'conflict of interest' is to prevent the judge from doing something corrupt. However with God, He will never do anything corrupt and so that law is not needed.

I then pointed out to the Muslim fellow that his god is especially not just. Allah can apparently forgive someone without their fine being paid. The man then tried to propose that Allah put in a law of justice to give him that right. However, I responded by saying that the concept of justice is not defined by the judge, but rather it is the same regardless of who the judge is. And justice is: criminals who break the laws get the fine or punishment that transgressing that law entails. So by the definition, Allah is definitely not just, yet he claims himself to be just. That is an internal contradiction proving that Allah does not in fact exist. So then I explained the gospel to him, that in Christ's death God's justice is satisfied and because of that we can go to Heaven when we die if we trust Him as our Saviour and Lord.

The conversation then moved onto Jesus' death and I pointed out that it is a historical fact. He did not deny the crucifiction, however he believes it was of another man who Allah had made to appear as though it was Jesus (Surah 4:157). So Josh Williamson perked up and made the profound point that then that would make Allah a deceiver and a sinner like you and me. So that points out another internal contradiction within Islam because Allah claims to be holy.

At this time the Skypecast was nearing the end, so Josh handed it over to Ralph who preached an in-depth gospel message. Please pray that this man and the Muslims listening will be converted. Also please pray that next week we will not have any technical difficulties. :)

We will have another Skypecast at the same time next week - Sunday 9pm - 12am GMT+10. If you would like to advertise the upcoming Operation 513 Skypecasts on your webpage/blog/myspace, please visit the Skypecast page and that will give you the instructions on how you can do so.

To God be the glory!

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The evening starting off very very slow and stayed that way for pretty much the entire Skypecast. However, that didn't mean we had no hecklers though.

We had a couple hecklers from New Zealand who said there was no God. I went through some basic proofs for God's existence and they admitted there must be a God. I then went on to proving the judgment, however, this is where these larrikins became unreasonable. They would jump topics, and not listen to anything we were saying. So we ended up having to drop them down to the listening area. However, they now have some things to think about because Josh Williamson went onto explaining the law and the gospel.

Andrew spoke to an American man who at first claimed to be a Christian. So Andrew asked him how someone gets to Heaven. The man explained his conversion experience by 'asking Jesus into his heart' a number of years ago, but he went onto say that he is trusting in his good works to get him to Heaven. Andrew pointed out that if he is not trusting Christ alone for salvation, he won't get to Heaven. The man was very concerned about this and asked for more information. So Andrew explained the full gospel and what a person must do to be saved to this fellow so that he understood it. The man said he would get right with God immediately. Praise be to God.

There were also a few technical difficulties throughout the evening, such that people would randomly be muted for a short period of time. Please pray that this will not happen in future weeks.

We will have another Skypecast at the same time next week - Sunday 9pm - 12am GMT+10. If you would like to advertise the upcoming Operation 513 Skypecasts on your webpage/blog/myspace, please visit the Skypecast page and that will give you the instructions on how you can do so.

To God be the glory!

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Our first heckler was a fellow who we've chatted to in the past; he claimed that our representation of God is incorrect. So I asked him why he thought that. He said, "Because there are so many religions in the world that have different gods". I responded, "So? That doesn't mean that our God doesn't exist." He realised his fleeting position, so he then said, "It doesn't show that your God is right." However, I pointed out to him that he was claiming the negative position saying that our God does not exist, so logically, he must have good evidence to back up that claim. Otherwise, he can only say, "I'm not sure if your God exists or not." So then I proceeded to give a positive case for the God of the Bible, but he didn't like it and he kept trying to talk over me. We eventually had to drop him down because he was being unreasonable.

Josh Williamson had a chat with a person who made the claim that no god exists. So Josh inquired of what astounding evidence he had to prove that absolute negative. He could only say, "Because there is no evidence for God." However, that is not legitimate back-up for him to make the absolute claim that no god exists. He can only say, "I'm not sure that God exists or not", unless he has absolute knowledge about everything (which would then be self-refuting: 'I have infinite knowledge to tell you there is no being with infinite knowledge') or he has found a logical inconsistency within God. He could say neither. So then Josh provided a positive case for God's existence and talked about the judgment that is to come after we die, and then onto the wonderful news of the gospel.

Andrew Hsu had a discussing with a man named 'Diamond' about the subject of evolution. However, Diamond was confusing Natural Selection and Evolution together. They are two different concepts - Natural Selection is the process of species adapting to their surroundings by losing genetic information. Evolution is the concept that species gain beneficial information through mutations so that it gets more complex. Natural Selection has been observed, Evolution hasn't. Diamond said, "Look at how certain bugs are developing resistance to pesticides, that proves Evolution." However, that is just natural selection. You see, the bugs did not develop the resistance, but rather the bugs that were already immune to the pesticide live and reproduce, while all the other bugs die.

Right when the closing gospel message was about to be preached, God opened the flood gates of people to hear the message. The user count jumped up to over 80 people in the Skypecast at the one time. In fact all up, there were 319 people from 61 different countries who listened in. Many of these countries are closed to the gospel where missionaries are not allowed to visit, but praise be to God that they can hear the gospel through Skype.

We will have another Skypecast at the same time next week - Sunday 9pm - 12am GMT+10. If you would like to advertise the upcoming Operation 513 Skypecasts on your webpage/blog/myspace, please visit the Skypecast page and that will give you the instructions on how you can do so.

To God be the glory!

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The night started off a bit slow, although first up we had a Jewish heckler who professed that he had nothing wrong. He was very hard-hearted and self-righteous, so Josh showed him the law of Moses. The fellow didn't like being convicted of his sin so he kept trying to change the topic. Josh was also able to show that Jesus is the Messiah that can take the punishment for our sins.

We then had a chat with Raven, who believed that the God of Christianity is the same one as the Islamic god. She even tried to make the case that in Aramaic, the name of God sounds so similar to "Allah". Except Josh pointed out that "Eloi" is not similar at all to "Allah". I also pointed out that the scriptures of the two religions are so different that they simply cannot both be from God. For example, the Qu'ran says that there is one god. But the Bible says there is one God, but made up of three distinct persons. They're mutually exclusive and so they both cannot be true at the same time.

Our next heckler held the belief that the best idea is not to actually pick a religion because they are all based on faith. I showed him that they're not all based on faith, in fact the major events in Christianity, such as Jesus death on the cross and even his resurrection are historical events. Even archeology agrees with what the Bible says. Moreover I argued that every other world religion is logically inconsistent because they think you can get to Heaven based on your good works. However that means their god's justice is not upheld. In Christianity, God's justice is still satisfied, yet he is shows his mercy because of Jesus' death on the cross.

Josh had a chat with a Catholic fellow who asked what proof there is for God's existence. So Josh explained the teleological argument - the complexity and fine-tuning of the unvierse gives evidence of an intelligent designer. After establishing God's existence, Josh then went onto the law and gospel.

The next heckler we had was an Aussie bloke who didn't hold to any religion and he kept making the claim that the things in the Bible are fairy tales. So I asked him what proof he have that these stories are just fairy tales. He just said, "With logic we know that it is wrong." So I asked again, "What logical argument do you have to prove it is a fairy tale?" He had nothing.

So I explained that events in the Bible are historical and we have evidence for that. But then said, "Oh, but they were all uneducated back then." I pointed out that some of the greatest minds were around back then, such as Plato, Socrates, Aristotle, etc. He then admitted, "OK, the events are probably historical."

He also denied that there is a god, so explained the Kalam Cosmological argument to him and then after that admitted that there is a god. He then pointed out that that does not mean that god is the God of the Bible. And that's true, so then I passed it onto Josh Williamson who was doing the closing gospel message and he explained why we can know Christianity is true.

Overall, it was a great night. We had 345 people listen in during the course of the evening, with at one point having over 100 people in the Skypecast. We discovered that over these last two Skypecasts, we have had people listening in from over 70 different countries from around the globe.

We will have another Skypecast at the same time next week - Sunday 9pm - 12am GMT+10. If you would like to advertise the upcoming Operation 513 Skypecasts on your webpage/blog/myspace, please visit the Skypecast page and that will give you the instructions on how you can do so.

To God be the glory!

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The night started off pretty slow with no hecklers wanting to speak for about the first hour. Or for the ones that did want to speak, their microphones were not working. However there was still a lot of people in the listening area.

Josh Williamson had a conversation with an American who believed in the theory of evolution. Josh showed why it is not a scientific fact, but rather just another belief because the evidence supporting it is non-existent.

Our second heckler was a Hindu man who said he believed in millions of gods. He then went on to say that god is in everything (panentheism). So then I asked him, "If there are millions of gods, which god is in everything?" He then said, "Oh there is only one god." The fellow then explained that he thought that a person gets reincarnated seven times then they will either be sent to Heaven or Hell. So I asked him where he thinks he's going to go. He wasn't sure, so I went onto the law and the gospel with Him.

Josh had a chat with a man who had questions about the trinity. He made the assertion that the Bible does not contain the doctrine of the trinity in it. The guy was mixing up what he believed - one sentence he would be a modalist (Father, Son, Holy Spirit are all same person), next sentence he was denying that Jesus is God, and the next sentence he would hold to the Biblical view. Josh cleared up the issue with him explaining what the Bible says about who God is - three distinct persons yet one in essence.

It was another good night overall in which the gospel was preached to 115 listeners.

We will have another Skypecast at the same time next week - Sunday 9pm - 12am GMT+10. If you would like to advertise the upcoming Operation 513 Skypecasts on your webpage/blog/myspace, please visit the Skypecast page and that will give you the instructions on how you can do so.

To God be the glory!

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At the scheduled time of 9pm the Skypecast started and pretty much instantaneously the room filled up with people and there were many folks who wanted to have their say.

So the first heckler we had was a Muslim lady from Egypt. I asked her why she is a Muslim, and she responded, "because my parents are." She couldn't give any objective reasons why someone would become a Muslim. So I then asked about what happens after she dies, she said there is a judgment. And good people go to Heaven, and bad people go to Hell. I then showed that if God lets someone into Heaven because of their good works, he is then not a just judge. Yet that is how the god of Islam operates, yet the Qu'ran says that Allah is just, exposing a fundamental internal contradiction proving Allah's non-existence. The lady admitted that it was a contradiction. So I posed the question to her, "Why would you believe in something that you know is false?" I then explained to her how she can have her sins forgiven while God's justice is upheld and yet He still shows his love, and that was by the death of Jesus Christ.

Andrew Hsu then discussed with another Muslim person and when asked why he thinks Islam is true, he said because his parents said so. The man then tried to say the Qu'ran has never changed but the Bible has. When Andrew asked for what evidence he has for that claim, the man was speechless.

Andrew then had a discussion with a skeptic named Peter, who we have spoken to in the past. He tried making the claim, "why do Christians believe in the trinity when it's not in the gospels?" Andrew informed the fellow that it is in-fact throughout it and he gave various scripture references.

I then had a chat with another Muslim heckler who said that she would actually answer my questions about Islam unlike the other Muslims who we spoke to earlier. So I then brought up the fundamental flaw regarding Allah's contradictory justice, which then lead straight into the true gospel. She couldn't answer that contradiction.

Josh Williamson then dealt with a Catholic man who said he is going to Heaven because he just went to confession. Josh showed him in the Bible where it says we are saved by grace through faith alone and contrasted that to what the Catholic Catechism of 1993 states that it is by yours works that you get to Heaven.

After this, I had a chat with a Sikh fellow. During the conversation I pointed out three internal contradictions within Sikhism:
1. Sikhism believes we are all part of God. That means God could not fully exist before the creation of the universe.
2. Sikhism believes all religions are true. Except because of the vastly different claims made within the various religions and the law of non-contradiction, they all cannot be true.
3. The Sikh god judges based on a person's good works and bad works, making him unjust.

The fellow could only respond by saying, well this is what I believe. So I pointed out, the task of the individual is examine the various religions and find out which one is true. They all cannot be true, and you shouldn't just believe in a religion because your parents do.

Andrew Caswell then finished up the Skypecast with an in-depth law and gospel message calling everyone to repentance and faith.

Overall, it was a great night with a constant flow of hecklers wanting to speak, and a total of 280 people listened in.

We will have another Skypecast at the same time next week - Sunday 9pm - 12am GMT+10. If you would like to advertise the upcoming Operation 513 Skypecasts on your webpage/blog/myspace, please visit the Skypecast page and that will give you the instructions on how you can do so.

To God be the glory!

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At the usual time of 9pm the Skypecast kicked off without any technical difficulties. Almost immediately we had a gentlemen named Peter who wanted to have a chat with us. So we brought him up to the talking area and he said that he doesn't believe in God. So I explained why it is the rational viewpoint to believe in God using logical arguments, and showed why if he continues to say there is no God in light of the evidence to the contrary, he denies God's existence on the basis of faith alone. I then showed him why there needs to be judgment after we die, and asked him if he would go to Heaven or Hell. After going through the law with him, he realised he was deserving of Hell. So then I preached the good news of the gospel to him and called him to repent and trust Christ as his Saviour.

However, he made the statement, "I will never believe that." By that statement that showed that it's not an intellectual problem he has in believing it, but rather a problem with his will. I explained that if someone does not become a Christian, it is usually because of one of these three reasons:
1) Because they love their sin and want to stay in it.
2) Because they have pride and do not want to bow the knee to Jesus Christ
3) Because they think they have done too many sins that Jesus can't pay for it (this is a rare case)

The conversation ended soon after because we had another person who wanted to speak and had been waiting for 20 minutes already before he could do so. However Peter stayed and listened to the entire Skypecast right to the end. Please pray that God will change Peter's heart so that he will flee from his love of sin and trust Christ.

The next person who wanted to speak was Rambit. Rambit was an atheist, so firstly I proved the existence of God to him. Because he had no leg to stand on there, he tried bringing up numerous other objections to the Christian faith, such as original sin and he even said that adultery was okay. He said he didn't mind if someone pervs upon his wife or even commits adultery with her. That clearly shows that he truly does not love his wife. In fact, Rambit said pornography is alright as well because the ladies willingly put up their photos up on the Internet. He said that child pornography was wrong, however Josh pointed out that he has a double standard, because what about those children who willingly put up their photo onto the Internet? Rambit saw his fleeting moral standards but decided to go onto a tangent without letting Josh speak. So we had to move him down into the listening area so Josh could respond to his comments. It is sad to see someone who has suppressed that conscience so much that they even try to justify their sin.

After that conversation was over, Tanika wanted to join in and make a quick comment regarding the conversation that just occurred. She was a UN worker in Bangkok that works with women who have been trapped in the sex trade business. She made the profound point that women do not willingly involve themselves in the pornography business, but rather the majority of them are forced.

I thanked Tanika for her insightful comments and then asked her about what beliefs she had. She said she was raised a Hindu but married a Catholic. She studied the various religions at a Catholic college and even taught there for a number of years. However, she now deems herself a non-religious spiritualist. She didn't know what happens after she dies but knew that there is a God. So I showed her that there must be a judgment after we die, which then lead onto the law, and the gospel.

Ralph Patrick then did the closing gospel message, but his microphone stopped working half way through. So I finished the gospel presentation calling everyone that was listening to repent and believe.

We will have another Skypecast at the same time next week - Sunday 9pm - 12am GMT+10. If you would like to advertise the upcoming Operation 513 Skypecasts on your webpage/blog/myspace, please visit the Skypecast page and that will give you the instructions on how you can do so.

To God be the glory!

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There was a delay in getting the team into the Skypecast tonight, this was not due to technological problems, but rather due to the fact that I had to drive down the Gold Coast to pick Josh Mitchell, and Keith Rochford up from the Southport Watch house, where they were being detained after being arrested for preaching the Gospel.

At just after 10pm, I was able to get into the Skypecast, and Josh Mitchell took the floor and presented the gospel to those who were in the room listening. While he was talking I was sent a message by a Muslim man named Talal who wanted to debate Islam versus Christianity.

So I brought him up and began to talk to him about Islam. He presented the case on why the Bible cannot be trusted, so I answered him from an apologetic position on why we can trust the Bible. He then launched in on the central doctrine of Christianity, and that was attacking if Jesus Christ was even crucified. He maintained as the Koran teaches, that Jesus was not crucified, but rather Allah preformed a ‘miracle' and made someone else look like Jesus, and thus deceived all those who were at the cross. From here we looked at why Allah would deceive and lie to his creation. That was a good jumping off point to look at the God of the Bible "who cannot lie".

From there we went into the Law of Moses, and as we walked through the law Talal didn't want to talk anymore. It is rather amazing that as soon as sin is revealed people aren't interested in dialogue. Since there were people in the room listening, I decided to keep on preaching the gospel even though Talal had left.

After this Josh Mitchell and Andrew Hsu had a discussion in regards to evolution, and the night finished off with Andrew Hsu preaching the gospel.

It was a shorter Skypecast, but the Gospel still went out!

 

 

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A number of hours before the Skypecast's commencement, I advertised the Skypecast at a number of Atheist forums. I asked them to join in and have their say about why they believe there is no god.

At our regular time of 9pm the Skypecast started, and without a hitch thankfully! Praise God for that! And continued working pretty well the entire night.

Our first heckler was a man who said he was an Atheist. So what I did was give him some logical reasons to believe in the existence of God. I did this by showing him that the universe needs an outside cause (using the Cosmological argument), then I explained that the cause must also be personal. Through this logic, the fellow admitted there must be a personal God and thanked us for our time. But I wasn't going to let him go just yet without hearing about the law, then the gospel. So our discussion continued and he had several questions regarding morality. I addressed them and showed him God's standard of morality in the Bible, the Ten Commandments. He knew he had failed at that standard, but he tried using the fallacious objection that because God created us, that when we sin it is God's fault. I reasoned with him regarding that and also showed him that his good works do not merit himself to God. He was then concerned about where he would spend eternity, so I gave him the good news of the gospel.

After the conversation was finished with the first heckler, Josh let me know that there was a person who objected to what I was saying because he thought it was illogical. He was an Australian man from the Richard Dwakins Atheistic forum. His objection was that what I was saying is based on the premise that God exists. This fellow wasn't in the Skypecast when I was showing the first gentlemen the proofs for God's existence, so I briefly explained them to him. After some initial objections to my arguments, he finally agreed that there must be a personal Creator to the universe. His next objection was that my argument did not prove the God of the Bible. And that's true, so I then presented some reasons as to why only the God of Christianity exists. I did this by showing that every other religion's god is logically inconsistent because they believe that their god will weigh out your good deeds with your bad deeds. I showed him that is not justice at all. But at this point, everyone was dropped from the room because of a Skype problem. But we managed to get back into the room okay.

Josh Williamson then had a conversation with a man who held some very illogical beliefs. He regarded animals as having the same value as human beings. So Josh asked him, "Do you eat meat?" He said, "Yes." Josh replied, "Do you eat humans?" He said, "No." So Josh then pointed out that he truly doesn't regard humans and animals as having the same value if he only eats animals.

I then had a discussion with a person from Armenia. He believed he was a good person, so I showed him God's laws and that he realised he didn't meet the standard. But he tried using the objection that because everyone fails at that standard, it makes hiim good. I proceeded to show him why that view is illogical. I then told him what Hell is like, so that I could tell him of the wonderful news of Christ's death on the cross for our sins. I explained to him what he must do to be saved and to really think about these important issues.

Josh Mitchell completed the Skypecast with an in-depth gospel message, calling everyone to repent and trust Christ as their Saviour.

All up there was 511 people who listened in to the Skypecast during the course of the night. Please pray God will draw them to Himself.

We will have another Skypecast at the same time next week - Sunday 9pm - 12am GMT+10.

To God be the glory!

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