“How Can You Remove Your Sins?” – Reading Evangelism
After a week's break over Christmas, it was good to return to the open air. Today’s adventure found me in Reading, working with a team of supportive brothers from several churches. The weather initially looked a bit questionable, but during the outreach, we had blue skies – though it was cold and windy. One of the blessings of Reading is that we have so many preachers. Today, six of us open-air preached – all sharing the same gospel truths in slightly different ways.
I commenced the preaching by testing out my new talk, “How Can You Be Sure You’ll Go to Heaven?” In this message, I seek to show the bad news, then the good news – with a challenge at the end asking people what stops them from trusting in Jesus. A few people listened, and then at the end of the message, four people took copies of John’s Gospel.
Next up to preach was Jack. He shared his testimony, which caused a few people to stop. One Muslim man who stopped told us he had been walking along the street listening to a debate on YouTube between a Muslim and a Christian, and then he heard the preaching. He had a good chat with Jack and took a copy of the New Testament.
We had a constant stream of preachers throughout the two hours we were on the street, with Richard, Fergus, Jamie, and Bill all preaching. While they proclaimed the Word, over at the Bible table, Trevor was busy talking to a steady flow of people who were browsing the literature.
Some outreaches drag on, but today went by quite quickly. I finished our time by preaching on “The Good Person Test.” At first, not much happened; a few people listened, but there was no engagement but then along came a Muslim heckler. The man first stood beside me and started to say something that wasn’t clear. He was hard to understand, but he drew a crowd. As we went back and forth, I asked, “How can you remove your sins?” The Muslim replied by speaking about his works and efforts. I pointed out that will not remove his sins; so I asked again, “How can you fix your sin problem?” This time he said God could remove his sin, so I asked, “How can God do that?” There wasn’t a clear answer given, so I used this as the opening to lift high the Lord Jesus. As I explained the gospel, the heckler tried to object, but people listened. Then, at the end, five people took copies of John’s Gospel, and the Muslim heckler hugged me.
The Lord was kind to Reading today. Please pray for all those who heard the good news.
SDG!
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Josh Williamson is a full-time evangelist with The Open-Air Mission. Since 1853, OAM has been sharing the good news on the streets of the United Kingdom. To stay updated about the work of the Mission, please sign up for the free quarterly magazine and monthly prayer notes.
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