Evangelism

Tuesday night at The Bridge Bible Study (we call it a "Bridge Group"), I challenged the members of the group to pray a prayer every morning. I told them to pray that God would put someone in their path who they could talk to; witness to; share with; or pray with. I also told them they would be amazed at the people who would be placed on their path.

The next night, we had our first community event at a local coffeeshop. The coffeehouse is normally closed on Wednesday nights because the owner is a pastor at a small Baptist church, but he agreed to keep it open so we could have our event. His employee even placed a sign on the door that stated they were "Closed Due to a Private Party". When I noticed the sign, I asked the employee to take it down because "you never know who may just wander in" and she obliged my request.

As we began the presentation on the new church, a gentleman walks in and is greeted by one of our core team. He is polite but states he is not there for our meeting and just wanted a cup of coffee. Our Core Team Member was very gracious to him and invited him in. He sat right behind the screen and was approximately 6 feet from where I was speaking. I gave my testimony and told how I was raised in church, but there came a time when I kicked God out of my life completely. I wanted to do life on my on and from a worldly perspective, I did very well and yet I was completely empty inside. I continued to tell how the only way that I found to fill the hole in my life was to invite Christ back into it. All the time, this gentleman is sitting in the coffeehouse.

After the presentation, I was answering questions from the others who had come to the gathering in order to learn more about The Bridge and I noticed another one of our Core Team Members gathering some coffeecups that had the Bridge logo on them and were filled with candy and taking them to those who had come in (including the gentleman behind the screen). Our team member said, "We're a new church just starting in the area and we're glad you're here tonight. Everything you ordered is on the house, compliments of the Bridge and we also would like to give you this coffeemug." He politely slide the coffee mug back to the team member and said, "No thanks, I'm an Atheist." Our Core Team Member replied, "That's okay, we're still glad you're here and you can still have the coffee mug."

After everyone had left, the team member came and told our group what had happened and he said, "I prayed that prayer this morning and I didn't know God was going to place an Atheist in my path right off the bat!" Yet, one of his first experiences of sharing the grace of Christ was to an Atheist and he came away with all his fingers, toes, and no blood was spilled. As we aggressively reach out to people with the radical hospitality of Jesus Christ and as we sincerely pray that God will place people in our paths to share the Greatest Story Ever Told, we can expect to be reaching to those most people would not reach to. I believe with all my heart that there was a reason the Atheist was at a coffeehouse (that is normally closed) with a bunch of Jesus freaks! I believe that a seed was planted that night. We may never see the growth of that seed and it may not have been our seed that caused an openness of her heart to happen. It may take ten or twenty more seeds to be planted. Sometimes, we may be blessed to plant a seed, water it, nurture it and cultivate it as growth takes place and we can rejoice when that happens. However, there are going to be numerous occasions where we plant a seed and thats all we have the opportunity to do.