One of our evangelism group members emailed another seed sower in another part of the country about our recent visit to the courthouse.  Looks like we will have to record everything we do there.  The body of the email is as follows.

Hi Maritza,
I just want to encourage you in your courthouse endeavors, that has been the greatest blessing for our evangelism team at church. It has given us many opportunities to give the gospel message and then see how we can improve our way of doing it. It doesn’t matter if there is 10 or 1 in line, what matters is that you remain faithful to what God is calling you to do. Good job sis! We have also been blessed with a few visits from the local police, they weren’t being honest with us on most of the visits, they just want opposition to go away, they don’t care how that happens. But we found out that we have every right to be there and it has given us confidence as we continue.
I can’t tell you how this will help you with your presentation of the gospel if you continue practicing there. The only warning I have is don’t try it alone, it will be your word against many in line that don’t want to hear it. We video every time and use that for evidence if the police arrive and say we are saying things that were not.
I’m excited that you have a team to go with, encourage them to go often. We started out going on Wednesday and Thursday mornings, now we go Monday thru Friday. God is so good.

So we will be recording everything, and maybe we can post some of the open air preaching.  So if you cannot join us, then check the blog for updates.

Beautiful day to preach the Good News to the folks at the county courthouse.  We found out that Friday was the slowest day of the week, so the crowd was relatively small.  But we are faithful to follow God’s command to preach the Good News and we trust that His Word will not return void.  To Him be the glory.  I got to preach open air for the first time this year and we handed out tracts.  Robert got into a great 1-2-1 discussion afterwards, and he was able to open up the Word and show how Jesus was a fulfillment of Old Testament prophecy.  This is a picture of Robert afterwards….please pray for this soldier, that he will be saved. 

We are planning on meeting again at the courthouse this Monday morning.  Please join us.

Territory Days has been a washout this year.  But today, the last day of the festival, we had great weather.  The crowds started building at 10am and the tracts started disappearing.  We handed out over a thousand tracts in an hour or two.   The hot tract was the Obama 1,000,000,000,000 bill.  Funny reactions, but they went like hotcakes(except for those few who freaked about Obama on the front of the bill). The famous Obama tract is this one…….the link to the Tract site is HERE

I did talk to someone named Andrea who is a former Lutheran and now attends a Baptist church in town with her boyfriend, but she really does not believe in all this stuff.  I shared the gospel with her and she was definitely convicted.  She said her mother was a “shauman”, so things for her are interesting.  Pray that she will read the book of John and that God will draw Himself to her in love and that she may be saved.

God bless

Steve and Connie

A shoutout to Steve in Northern Colorado on his new blog site, Gospel Sheepdog.  I am reminded of the saying that evangelists are like the shepherds sheepdogs, rounding up all the sheep.  And the shepherd is entrusted with the care of the sheep.  The analogy is a little flimsy, but still has some truth in it. 

Anyway, Steve is part of a bunch of seed sowers North of us, and we have to meet up with them in Denver some time.

There is a new skateboard park in Colorado Springs and what a great place for witnessing. Memorial Park Skate  is a big place with tons of kids swarming around.  We stopped there today after church and talked to a bunch of kids around the park and in the parking lot.  Please pray for Daniel, as he listened to the gospel and said he would investigate it further. 

We are thinking of doing a “tailgate” there sometime.  Maybe with sandwiches or hot dogs, while handing out tracts and preaching.  Details to follow.

If You’re Not Fishing, You’re Not Following

On a recent fishing expedition, Robert reminded me about Mark Cahill’s book “One Thing You Can’t Do In Heaven” and what he wrote about following Jesus Christ.

When you look in the Gospels, you see recorded there Christ’s life and the things He did and said.  Upon close examination of the very first recorded thing Jesus spoke and the very last recorded thing Jesus spoke, His mission (and ours) is very clear.

His first words:  “Come, follow me and I will make you fishers of men.”  So if you are following Him, you should be actively trying to reach the lost with the greatest news in history.

Now, consider this.  If you were coming to the very last minutes of your time here on earth, don’t you think you would choose the last words you would ever speak very carefully and make certain that they conveyed the most important message you wanted to leave your loved ones with?  Of course you would.  When our Lord left earth to return to Heaven, don’t you think He would give us the same kind of message?  Of course He would and He did.  So what did He say?

His last words: “Go therefore into all the world and preach the good news to all creation” in Mark, “Therefore, go and make disciples of all nations” in Matthew.

His first words and His last words express the very reason He left the glory of Heaven and took on frail flesh.

Many Christians today have made sharing the gospel with the lost optional or something best handled by the ‘professionals’.  How many of us say that we are followers of Christ but do nothing to personally share the Gospel with the lost?

Please, be a real follower of our Lord and remember that followers fish for men!

And by the way, the fish don’t come to the fishermen.  The fishermen have to go to where the fish are and seek them out.

‘For I am not ashamed of the Gospel of Jesus Christ’ Romans 1:16   Go live it!

Connie

After sharing the gospel with a woman last night, she asked me if I was a pastor.  No, I said.  I am a pharmacist.  The look on her face was SO funny.  She was already freaked out about the things we were talking about, and she was not expecting me to tell her that I was a pharmacist.  It was actually pretty funny.

 Anyway, we had a great night of witnessing last night in beautiful downtown Colorado Springs.  Thanks for all your prayers.

The “fish” were biting and we had tons of strikes.  Everyone got into the act of sharing the Gospel, and we handed out lots of tracts and a few bibles.  It still amazes me that a lot of people we talk to, consider themselves to be Christians, but are counting on their own “goodness” to get them to heaven.  Even when confronted with the fact that they are sinners, the most popular response is that God will forgive them “if they say they are sorry”.   To which we usually respond in a few different ways…such as:

·         Are you REALLY sorry?  Do you understand the magnitude of what sin is, and how God is infinitely offended by it?  To describe this, we sometimes we use an analogy like this………  Suppose I get into a relationship with another woman and become intimate with her, and my wife finds out.  Do you think just saying “I’m sorry” is going to make things right?  Of course not!  I must repent of this whole thing and convince her that it will never happen again.  My pleadings and words are not something that I repeat after someone else, but genuine and heartfelt.  And my actions after repenting of this behavior will determine whether I was a changed person or not. 

·         Another way of describing this is to make another analogy of a judge in a court of law, here in town.  Suppose someone was caught doing something like stealing a car, or even killing someone.  If they tell the judge that they are very sorry for their actions, a good judge will say that they should be sorry, but will still have to pay a penalty for their actions.  Such is the case for a just and holy God who must judge sin.  “For the Lord will by no means let the guilty go unpunished”(Nah 1:3).  Brushing off the seriousness of self confessed sins such as lying, stealing or blasphemy will be dealt with very harshly by the Lord.  For “all liars will take part in the lake of fire”(Rev 21:8) .  And “no thief will enter the kingdom of heaven”(1 Corinthians 6:9-10).

Once confronted with this realization, most people are stunned and freaked out.  This is not something they have ever heard in church, or the world, and most come to understand that they are in big trouble if they are to depend on their own goodness.  This is when the grace of God makes sense and the need for a Savior is necessary.  But if a person we are witnessing to doesn’t feel Godly sorrow for their offense against Him with their sins, it would not make sense to share the need for a Savior.  Just telling someone to “believe” or “confess” or “accept” without true repentance, is a waste of time and a breeding ground to make false converts.

Please pray for all of those folks who heard the truth of the gospel last night.  And also, that the tracts and bibles that were given out, will be the “words of eternal life” to those who received them.  For “you also, after listening to the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and having believed, you were sealed in Him with the Holy Spirit”(Ephesians 1:13). 

Connie praying after sharing the gospel

Robert sharing. Also Connie with Lucy the wonder dog.

For those who check this blog, and are not on my email list, the following is a copy of the most recent email that was sent out.  If you would like to be on my list for email updates, let me know.

• Territory Days (May 23,24 and 25).  Old Colorado City.
• Visiting the courthouse and DMV weekday mornings to preach to those waiting to get in.
• Random Saturdays and Sundays at Prospect Lake. 
• There are some big events coming up in Denver that we will probably do a road trip to(or maybe just hit 16 Street Mall).
• We have some faithful seed sowers in Canon City that we may join on occasion.
• Anyone interested in meeting at Acacia Park at noon to witness to the high schoolers on lunch break?