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Hold fast the form of sound words, which thou hast heard of me, in faith and love which is in Christ Jesus (2 Timothy 1:13)

Friday Night Notes

Saturday, May 10, 2008
not too strong... but still going...


For a good part of the afternoon, I didn't think I had it in me to go out preaching tonight. I'm afraid my health is still a problem... enough of a problem that I felt too weak for an evangelistic effort. I don't really want to get into medical details on the world wide web, but just to clarify: I'm not dying, nor am I suffering from some terrible disease. That said, I am living with a great deal of discomfort so your prayers, dear saints, is very much appreciated.

Despite my hesitation, I did go out to the market to preach the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. Why? Well, surely, there was some personal pride in my decision making: I didn't want to be a wuss. With that though was a sincere desire to not let anything take this time of service away from me. No doubt the principalities and powers of darkness would love to see me fold under the stress of physical illness, no doubt the world would love to have one less evangelist to listen to, and no doubt my own sinful flesh would love to spend more time resting than delivering the Word of Truth to sinners. For all these reasons, I really wanted to be in the market tonight with pastor Tim, preaching the Gospel, despite my "thorn in the flesh".

To give myself a chance to go home earlier and give my body some rest, pastor Tim and I went out preaching earlier than normal. We still preached and handed out Gospel tracts for our usual three hours, but I was home about an hour earlier than normal, which given the circumstances, was quite nice.

There was tons of people in the market tonight. TONS! Both pastor Tim and I handed out a good number of Gospel tracts, and pastor Tim had a number of one-on-one conversations with souls who showed some interest in the Gospel of Jesus. The Lord definitely gave me strength to preach tonight. Despite my physical weakness, I was able to stand on that street corner and preach the Gospel for three half-hour shifts. Praise God.

The Lord also protected me from a couple of "rough" situations; and I thank Him greatly for that, 'cause I wasn't going to offer up much of a defense tonight! The first "nasty" came in the form of a man who decided to grab a handful of loose change from his pocket, and violently threw the lot in my direction. Amazingly, none of the coins hit me. The second "nasty" came in the form of a drunk man who wanted to thrash my Bible sign. I, of course, kept him from doing so, and that irritated the man to no end. Pastor Tim ended up coming to my rescue. He engaged the man in conversation and kept him away from me, while I walked a little further down the street and continued my preaching undisturbed.

Finally, I want to praise God for sending another labourer into the harvest of the market. Pastor Tim and I met a young man named Aaron tonight; he's a Reform Presbyterian, and the Lord convicted him to go out, distribute tracts, and share the Gospel. We need more good souls like this! We had a great conversation. I encouraged him to be disciplined in his evangelism, and to be faithful at it, that is, to not only evangelize from time to time, but to reserve specific times to evangelize and be regular at it. I hope the Lord will make a great evangelist out of Aaron. We need good and faithful evangelists!

With that, dear readers, I close this edition of the Friday Night Notes. I'm going to bed now; do I ever need the rest.

God bless you all.


Rand

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