Friday Night Notes

Christians... annoyed with the preaching of the Word...

Weather wise... it could hardly be better for mid-January in Canada.  Pastor Tim and I preached the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ to modest crowds for roughly three hours, in -5 degrees Celsius temperatures.  Compared to the -20s that kept us away from street preaching last month, -5C is downright balmy!

The market was quiet tonight.  Both Pastor Tim and I would go through stretches where we had no one to preach to.  Still, Pastor Tim reported having distributed a great number of Gospel tracts tonight; a feat I wish I could boast, but things were real quiet for me tonight.

Despite the lower volume of people, I was quite saddened by the beating our Bible signs took.  I picked those signs up off the ground 4-5 times, after being kicked to the ground by ungodly souls.  Pastor Tim was still able to find a silver lining in this:

"Well, they are reading the signs and are paying close enough attention to them to be offended!" he concluded.

A sad thing occurred tonight when Pastor Tim was preaching the Gospel.  A couple walked by and it was clear from the man's demeanor that he was no fan of Pastor Tim's evangelism.  This occurs several times on any given night of evangelism, but what made this particular event quite sad is that I knew the couple, we use to attend the same church assembly years ago.  I hadn't seen the man in over a decade so I called to him, wanting to talk to him, just to touch base.  He obliged, but I could tell that my old friend wasn't too comfortable talking to me while I held my Bible sign in one hand, and Gospel tracts in the other.  We didn't talk long... I conversation had a number of uncomfortable silences.  I felt so sad for the man.  I use to think like him, but the grace of God worked mightily in my life; I no longer fear the reproach of the Gospel.  I gladly bear it.  I wish he had also.

I saw Mike again tonight... and he stayed true to his word.  He said "hello" and thanked me for my service.  He took of Gospel tract and continued on with his friends.  While I appreciate his kindness, I can tell Mike is in a bad way again.  The Lord have mercy on him.

A lot more took place tonight, but I'm too tired to continue.  It's real late, and it's been an exhausting week.

Brothers and sisters, remember us in your prayers!


Rand