Battle Log

Wednesday, 22 May, 2019

Posted 28 May 2019, 12:33 PM by Matthew Andersen. Permalink

This past week of outreaches has been exciting seeing more and more people come out and many people hearing the gospel. Wednesday afternoon was no different. During the afternoon a number of people came up and did the flip chart, asked questions or were approached and came to hear what God has done to save sinners.

An early conversation was with two young ladies who'd grown up Catholic and were sure that they knew the way to Heaven but when asked, they had no idea. They rejoiced in their sin and laughed their way through the good person test but the realisation of the predicament seemed to hit home behind the charade. They were shown that they goodness can't pay their Hell punishment in the same way that it won't pay a speeding fine.

They were shown the desperate position that they are in but openly declared that they loved their sin and didn't want to give it up for anything. They didn't even get to hear what God has done to save sinners as they left gloating over some of the things they'd done.

Next with a conversation with Ryan who has spoken to the team before months ago. He too had a strong Catholic background but last time had asked many questions about the Bible. Not ones that were attempting to undermine it but ones with an interest to understand how it all worked together. He couldn't quite remember the gospel and so that was reiterated again for him and this time he seemed to get it. He once again was challenged with the seriousness of what had been said, that God had been merciful to let him live these past few months but that he wasn't guaranteed another reminder or another chance to respond in faith and therefore he should count the cost of following Christ and trust in Him today!

The last conversation of the afternoon was with Connor and unsurprisingly he too had a Catholic background. He had almost no memory of most the things the church teaches but said that he was already trusting in Jesus. As usual he was show God's goodness, his wickedness, the penalty this deserves and then was walked slowly through the gospel as he took a while to understand it.

What was exciting was that he did finally comprehend it. He was able to explain it back simply, even when he was challenged by questions. He came to understand that he may have believed that Jesus existed up until this point but that if he was to respond by trusting in Christ that this would be the first day that he'd ever done so, simply because before this point he didn't know what it even meant. He said he was thankful for the conversation, would open up his Bible when he got home and think about Jesus has said.

It was truly a display of God's providential rule as Connor was just waiting in the city for an hour before catching a flight back home that evening and he had the chance to hear for the first time in his life how a sinner can be forgiven.

Please be praying for those who heard the message today that God would mercifully show them their sin and cause them to trust in Him!