Tract Handing 101

From The Word Street Journal



Amen Paul and Kim!

Clothing / Food Mission

This past Sunday afternoon after church, “His Feet on the Street” was honored to take part in a free clothing/food drive in the Hispanic community in Canton, Ga.

The lady (AKA Firecracker) who put all this together is a mighty witness and prayer warrior who has participated in some His Feet on the Street events in the past. Her concept was very simple yet very ministry oriented in reaching the lost.

Several canopy tents were set up in different locations along a straight line. Within that line were also tables and tables of great condition donated clothing and household items.

The people who came were given three tickets per family member. These tickets were “redeemed” for the clothing or any other item they wanted on the tables. When the people got to the end of the line, we had folks bag up their items. It was during this time that more tickets were given out for the food.

While the people were waiting for the food, the full gospel was delivered. We had lots of Spanish tracts and a couple translators for those who spoke no English. Several people appeared to receive Christ. I say appeared because I don’t know their hearts, I don’t know if they were saying it thinking it was part of getting the free food, or if the Catholicism roots were so deeply held they were just agreeing to whatever we were saying.

But there was this one young man that I got to have a one-to-one talk with after he had been witnessed to by Firecracker. Firecracker had witnessed to him in both Spanish and English and it was very apparent that the Law had done its job and he seemed broken. I took him aside and gave him the good news of the gospel and he wanted to repent right then and trust Christ for salvation.

I told him to pray and pour out his heart to God and when he was done I would pray. He told me that he would be more comfortable praying in Spanish and I told him to go for it. (God understands Spanish, right?) A couple times while he was praying he would stop because of the tears. That started my water fountain. When he was finished I prayed for him and thanked God for leading the young man to us.

He wanted to stay around and get something to eat but he had to be at work by 3:00. I made sure he had a Spanish Bible and told him to start reading the book of John after he got off work that evening. He knew of a Bible preaching Spanish church up the road and I told him that he should go there and let the pastor know what happened here today and request to get baptized.

Thank you Lord for leading that young man to us….thank you for Firecracker’s compassion for the lost people in the Spanish community of Canton….thank you for allowing HFOTS to be part of that experience.

Here are some pictures from last Sunday - - -

The pictures really don't do justice to the amount of people that were there that day; we must have had a couple hundred people go through the tables of free clothes and food.

I just want to remind everyone out there about events like this...If "we the church" hold events like this, or others like it, where we clothe people, feed people, do good deeds for people, entertain people, and never share the gospel of Christ, then all we do is make the world a better place for them to go to Hell from.

Yeah, I said it.
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Below is from Firecracker herself on last Sunday's event!

Look how God works!

Wow, He never ceases to amaze me. He led us to do a Free Clothing Community Drive. Some folks thought the Clothing Drive should have been cancelled due to the 60% chance of rain/thunder, etc... Wayne reminded me to look at things in a different perspective- which meant instead of 60% rain, to look at the 40% chance of sun- and all of the sudden things did look brighter.

Then as I prayed I thought of Nehemiah- he prayed for fire and the Lord answered. So I prayed for the rain to hold off. So, then someone asked “are you still doing the clothing drive- look at the weather- it is looking bad. I said yes, the Clothing Drive is on; my heavenly Father controls the universe and all in it, the clouds, the sun and the rain too.

My Father told me that if the team was willing to, to go ahead with it. God provided the clothes, thank you all who donated! He provided the workers and HFOTS to witness- couldn’t have taken place without you all! He provided the food, refreshments and he used caring and unbelievable generous hearts for this provision- thank you Shawn, Gina and Anne.

He even led us to a church while trying to buy Bibles, Kelly from Family Christian Store who didn’t know us referred us to someone who provided us with the rest of the tables we needed–

Thank you Sutallee Baptist Church- You rock!!

God provided the perfect weather and had many hearts prepared to hear his voice. We serve an awesome God. All we need to do is be willing to let Him use us and He does! Praise God for His Faithfulness and love!

We had hundreds of people come by; as we talked to people we came across many who still believe in traditions and rituals. This was heavy upon my heart because I felt these folks seem to be trapped and in bondage due to ignorant beliefs. That’s like saying the only way to send mail is via post office, when God has made a better provision like email. Why would you opt to only use the old way, if we have a better, faster and more effective way of getting something done. Why do we want to willingly continue to be in bondage with old traditions when the Lord sacrificed His life to free us from it and has given us a better way through Him?

As we witnessed at the clothing drive I came across many folks who were just so ready to hear God, some wanted to turn away from their sins, repent and surrender their hearts to Jesus, but many had doubts of how that worked or had many questions, not all of them came to the understanding that only the blood of Jesus could do a complete and once and for all sacrifice to pay our debt.

This tears me up, because when we don’t accept that his holy blood was more than enough, then we just lack understanding and faith of the holiness and power that is in that blood. We become like the Pharisees and because we can’t read in between the lines we miss Jesus all together when he is right at reach. It’s like the saying goes; you can lead the horse to water, but can’t make him drink it.

The same goes with the Gospel of Christ.

Only you can do that through faith in Him and through repentance, and I strongly emphasize that we are saved by grace, and grace alone, rather than by trusting in our own righteousness or religious traditions.

God is calling us to wake up, to turn from our ways, to surrender to Him and He will spare us from what is to come. Why must we make more complicated that what it is? Why do people think they should wait until their lives are better? We don’t have the power to change ourselves- only God can do that. He call us just as we are, he takes us all filthy and messed up and cleanses us thought that precious blood.

The Bible is God’s Word and people seem to be giving more value to what family/churches traditions say and get caught up in all that instead of grabbing God’s Word and reading it, they will soon see that their traditions and rituals contradict Holy Scripture if they took the time to read it. They have no idea that they are risking losing an opportunity that may never come again.

Some religious people hold to the teachings of their church to be on a par with, or of greater authority than, Holy Scripture. It is therefore often futile to try to convince them intellectually that their trust should be in the person of Jesus Christ, rather than in their own righteousness or in their church/family traditions. That’s why the 10 Commandments help them have a better understanding of how sinful we are. I wish people would just open a Bible, for I am sure it would come alive, in the book of John 16:13 says that if they would seek the truth, they would find the truth and they would be led by the Holy Spirit into it.

If we are open to the gospel, and are interested in what God's Word says then we would seek truth and not just take at a word what we are being taught in our churches, what we have been taught by our family traditions; we would listen to Scripture and ensure that what they say goes hand in hand with scripture.

For example, in Matthew 8:14 we see that Peter whom the Roman Catholic church maintains was the first pope, was married, as were many of the other apostles (see 1 Corinthians 9:5). If man preaches anything but the gospel unto you than that you have received, let him be accursed” Galatians 1:9. Christianity recognizes man as he is- utterly lost in sin, destined for eternal separation from God.

The Gospel gives us glorious news that Christ died for our sin –1 Corinthians 15:1-3 and that we can be saved by grace, through our repentance of sins and our personal faith in Christ, and nothing else- Any religion which teaches otherwise is, to that extent, is false. They need to car about investigating the truth, their lives depend on it.

Some people came to the drive for clothing, maybe for a hot dog, a soda, but some were fortunate enough to leave with more than that, they found eternal life with Jesus, they realized that they had been taught wrong, and found out for themselves what scripture had to say about their erroneous beliefs.

The only way to escape hell and separation from God is through depositing our faith in JESUS.

As I was witnessing to a big crowd while waiting to open a homeless man who had nothing but a bag with a set of clothes and a few personal things was the first one to raise his hand to surrender to Jesus- I looked at him and thought to myself - you may own nothing but what you are wearing, however, you may be the richest man standing in this group right now, for you have Jesus. Then he said he didn’t want any clothes, because others may have greater needs than him…I was amazed – God was already at work in his generous heart. He has no idea that God used him to break the ice with all the others who surrendered without fear publicly to Jesus.

Revelation 3:2-3 says “Wake up! Strengthen what remains and is about to die, for I have not found your deeds complete in the sight of my God. Remember, therefore, what you have received and heard; obey it, and repent.”

What completes us? Jesus!

Folks stop pressing the “snooze button” every time God is trying to wake you up, it may cause you to be running too late and you may not make it on time to give Jesus the invitation He is waiting for you to extend to Him.

Praying for lost souls,
Firecracker

Amen Firecracker.....great job. God bless you!!

Heritage Festival

Updated - Here is one of the team members from last Saturday with her comments on her conversation with one of the young men she had the opportunity to witness to.

I sat with Ellis, the cool dude that Wayne is hanging with in another Pic. “Patrick” was a 19 year old man from a small town in GA & they worked weekends running bungee jumping games together at festivals. Early on while I was talking to Ellis Patrick tried to get up & I stopped my chat with Ellis & asked him to stay and talk with me.

There is so much to say about Patrick, as we spoke for about 30 minutes or so.
Patrick was um, LOST! He has obviously been very influenced by the world in terms of his belief system. His grandmother had just died & he was “angry at God. “ (this was after he said he “didn’t believe” in Him).

He had never really attended church. We talked about evolution (thankfully we just had that WOTM lesson!) At one point he stated that he really identified more with the “Romans & their gods” rather than one Creator. He asked me to explain how; if Jesus was a Jew he could be the savior.

That was interesting.

Since he was very interested in world cultures I asked him if he would take just one night & explore the Word. Wayne offered up a bible & I flagged the book of John for him. I asked him to invest in one evening’s worth of reading to explore the Truth as one option for him to consider. I handed him the bible & he said he would not read one word of it; he was “just not interested”.

Patrick said that if Jesus Christ was real, he wanted to be visited by him in the flesh to prove that he was God. I told him he could have that encounter in the spirit if he explored the Word & ask God to reveal Himself to Patrick.

At one point during our conversation he did graciously allowed me to share the gospel with him. We went through the Law & Christ’s gift of salvation. Patrick is a very hardened young man.

I asked if I could pray with him – nope. I told he couldn’t stop me from praying for him. He said that was fine. We parted & Patrick went back to work.

Whew.

When I awoke the next morning he was the first thing that popped into my head. I cried a few tears, prayed for him and put my feet on the ground to start my day. Lord I pray you will draw Patrick to Yourself & that he would be a testimony to You on this earth.

Thank you C for your compassion for reaching the lost people all around us. It is a blessing for me (more than you know) to see those who have been through the WOTM classes out there on the frontlines of the battlefield.

Keep up the good work in the Lord!
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This past Saturday "His Feet on the Street" headed down to Ball Ground, Georgia to see if we could talk to people about spiritual things during the annual Heritage Festival.

The weather was a little hot and a lot muggy and we even had a mini storm to come up and run folks off for a while.

Our team of four handed out tracts and talked to those who would let us. It seemed every time I turned around, the ladies in our group were connecting with people and getting to have some great conversations. When I saw the girls chatting with people I would stop handing out tracts and pray for them right then.

One of the things I try to do we when go out to witness is to make sure everyone has a partner. This is huge! When one person is engaged in conversation, the other person should be quietly praying (For God to draw that person to Christ, for no distractions, for the full gospel to be proclaimed,etc.).

Here are some pictures from Saturday -


Above: One team member witnessing to some teens.



Here I am with a young man named Thomas whom I had the pleasure of talking with for a while.


Here I am with one cool cat named Ellis. Ellis and I had a great conversation right after the mini storm shut down the bungee rides he was operating.


Here is one of our team members having a tough and heart breaking conversation with a young man (maybe I can get her to post a few words about this conversation... how about it C?).


Here is my wife with a couple guys (Thomas and Jason) she had the pleasure of talking to. The fellow on the right, Jason, is a new believer in Christ.

Thank you Lord for allowing us the time to spend with these folks. I pray each and every tract that we passed out and the conversations we had will bring glory and honor to You. I pray Father that you use those tracts and conversations to bring people to repentance and faith in Christ.

Indian Festival Video

Here is a witnessing encounter I had with a couple at the Indian Festival. This conversation lasted about 15 minutes and I tried a few times to reconcile the gentleman's Christian confession with his reincarnation beliefs.

When I tried to transition the conversation to the Law, the gentleman would tell me he didn't want to get into a religious discussion.

Could that be open air I smell?

Last Saturday at the Indian Festival we were able to hand out hundreds of tracts and talk to quite a few people in the time we were there.

I personally was able to talk to people who, believed in evolution, believed in reincarnation, believed all religions were basically the same, and believed they were going to Heaven because they were good people.

There was only one couple who agreed to let us videotape our conversation (In New Orleans it was the other way around). But this couple was very nice and friendly and we had a 10-15 minute chat about their spiritual beliefs. My oldest son and I were handing out tracts to folks on their way into the Festival when we came across this couple who we engaged in some conversation with.

When I asked about their spiritual beliefs, she told me she was a Shaman and he told me he was a Christian. I asked if I could video the conversation and they agreed. I hope to post that video Friday evening or Saturday morning.

One conversation I had was with an elderly woman who had just graduated from the University of Miami with a degree in Religious Studies. I had been handing out tracts like a madman when a lady approached me and asked what I was giving out (I love it when that happens). I told her I was handing out Trillion Dollar Bills. She was delighted to take one. I told her there was a gospel tract on the back and asked her if she had a spiritual background of any kind. She said she did but insisted I talked to her mother who had just graduated from college.

Ok –

So we walk over to where mom was sitting and the daughter tells me that mom is kind of hard of hearing so I would need to make sure I talked very loudly when speaking to her .

I asked some basic starting point questions and just let her talk for a while. She talked about college some and then starting telling about all the different religions she had studied. I asked her what was different about the Christian religion from all other religions in the world? She thought about it for a few minutes and said that Jesus said he was the way, the truth, and the life and that no one went to the Father except through Him.

Very good.

Me: Do you believe that to be true? That the only way to Heaven is through Jesus Christ?

Her: Well, I don’t know.

Me: Is there any other differences that you can think of between Christianity and all other religions?

Her: mmmm

Me: All the other religions in the world there is a work system. You have to earn your way into Heaven and even then, you’re not guaranteed to get there. Christianity is faith based. Faith alone in Christ alone for salvation.

The conversation goes on for a little while now and I notice that there are quite a few people gathering around where we are talking. In fact, I notice one man with his back to us slowly taking steps backwards toward us to be able to hear us better. It was then that I remembered that we were talking in the area where the shuttle came by to pick people up and drop them off for the Festival.

By now there are easily 10 or more people standing all around us and they’re hearing every word we are saying. By now I’m going through God’s Law and explaining that one Day we will all stand before God.

As I’m going through the Law the daughter tells mom that she sees the shuttle coming and to go ahead and get her things together. I look around and realize that I have about a minute to present the gospel whether she was ready for it or not.

So, with an even louder voice (just to be sure everyone near us will hear), I proclaim the good news of the gospel for the mother, her daughter and everyone standing around.

The shuttle pulls up after I finish and people start getting on board. I shook the mothers hand and thanked her for listening to me and told her and her daughter to have a nice day.

God is so good.

He gently led me into a situation where I could loudly proclaim the good news to several folks at once. My fears of open air were not even an issue even after I found myself right in the middle of it.

Very cool!

Thank you to those who came out Saturday to bring the good news of the gospel to the lost folks at the Festival!!

God bless you -

Two events this weekend!

His Feet on the Street and some folks from the Way of the Master Intermediate Training Course class will be hitting two different events this Saturday!

Event number one will be the Rolling Thunder Indian Festival at Boling Park in Canton, Georgia. The annual Indian Festival is a great place to hand out tracts and talk to folks about the things of eternity. There will be folks from all kinds of backgrounds and many different spiritual beliefs.

Where: Boling Park - Canton, Georgia
When:12:30 pm to 2:30 pm
Meet: Meet at the paying entrance (there's only one)


Event number two will be the Car and Truck Show at First Baptist Church of Canton. This event is the fist of it's kind at FBC and I have no idea what the turn out will be. Hopefully the parking lot will be full of cars and trucks and we will have lots of opportunities to hand out tracts and talk to people.

Where: First Baptist Church of Canton, Georgia
When: 3:00 pm to 5:00 pm
Meet: Meet at the church front doors

If you can't make one of the events please try to come out to the other one.

Remember, if you are still a little shy about talking to people, you can still come and hand out a tract. If you are still a little shy about handing out tracts, please come out and walk around with us and pray!

I encourage all that come to swallow your fears and let God use you to reach the lost while you still have time!

Jesus is better than Football?

Is this how we should be preaching Jesus Christ and Him crucified?


Hat Tip - The museum of Idolatry