Battle Log

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Battle Log for Toowong Village : Tuesday December 17, 2019 1330-1500.

God vindicated our decision to continue serving at this chosen mission spot inspired by God despite the UQ school terms is over. Today three faithful members namely Col, Johnny who just came back from overseas trip and Hung turned up to serve. God was gracious enough to assign us ample divine encounter Kairos moments to share the Gospel. Johnny had at least four to five long chats with four groups of Chinese UQ students and one with a local Aussie boy. As for me, I got 9 chats of varying length with five Chinese, 3 Aussie and 1 Singaporean as recap below: -

1) My first gospel targets is a family of three from SGP by the name of Tsai, the parents came to visit their daughter and walking back to the daughter's apartment after finishing shopping. I Walked with the father for a distance long enough to share the gospel in a nutshell.

2) Franky is an UQ student from mainland China. He was in a hurry but I still managed to share him the gospel in a nutshell.

3) An English lady was greeted by me with the Merry Christmas card. She was given the explanation of the real meaning of "Merry" being the almighty power of God bestowed on us the sinners to be pardoned through the atoning grace of Jesus.

4) Kay is an UQ postgraduate from Xian, China. She stayed to do her summer study work and was on her way to meet a friend at a nearby mansion. She let me walked her all the way and listened to my sharing of full Gospel. She acknowledge Christianity has already become a thriving religion in China irrespective of persecution. Pray that God will get her over the line to receive salvation here in Brisbane.

5) Peter an UQ student from Beijing China, He got a Merry Christmas card from Col and I supplemented him with a full Good Person Tract. I walked him to the restaurant and gained enough time to share him the full Gospel which he appreciated and promised to ponder.

6) Joe , the Atheist I meet every Tuesday. I sang him the carol "God rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen" to attract him with the question why Christmas alone is described as merry while all else are described as HAPPY. Successfully, he was given to know that Merry was an old English word denoting divine power given by God to us through the birth of Jesus giving us the Free Gift of Eternal Life up for us to grab by repentance and accepting Jesus as our personal Savior and Lord of our Life. Surprisingly, Joe found this factual and accepted this old meaning of "Merry' has given Christianity the right perspective amongst all other religions.

7) An UQ student admitting she is a Communist party member as such she could not accept my tract. But it shows that there is strategic prospective to one day used by God to reach out to these "Least Reached People Group"

8) Jenny was an English lady who was elegant and polite
enough to take my merry Christmas card and found interest to learn from me the real biblical meaning of the word Merry.

9) A old Chinese man claimed to be christian but was too arrogant to let me clarify his faith.

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On Saturday, we gathered at the Starbucks as always. We shared on 1 Corinthians 15:1-11 and 2 Corinthians 5:14-15 with Charles Spurgeon’s book The Soul Winner. As a team, we took time to savour the gospel first and thank God for His death and resurrection by reading the scripture and praying and we were all ready to share the gospel with right motives. 

We had many great conversations but here are few highlight conversations. 

The very first conversation we had was with Muslim couple (Nowadays, it seems like we meet Muslims quite often, praise God !). They were very polite, listened well and answered the questions with honesty, we actually did not know they were Muslims in the beginning as they did not openly told us. The lady respectfully answered us that she still thinks that the righteous acts will still cover her wrong doings that she has done and God is merciful to forgive. But we answered her that God cannot contradict Himself (It seemed like she agreed with this truth as a Muslim too), if God is just God could not just forgive and violate one of his main attribute ‘justice’ that is why the cross of Jesus Christ is so crucial for God to stay Just and Loving at the same time. Furthermore, we mentioned that if we truly believe in the death and resurrection the forgiveness, eternal life and reconciliation with God is guaranteed so we don’t have to live in this ‘uncertainty’ of ‘will i make it to heaven?’. Please pray for this Muslim couple whom we had conversation. 

We encountered Chinese student, she spoke limited english so we were worried about the language barrier but she understood the questions and engaged into conversation really well. ‘Are you a good person?’ questions were perfect for her as she found it really interesting. When we asked her “Have you ever hated someone?” she said “yes” and we told her bible says “hatred towards someone in heart is same as committing murder in the bible” and to our surprise she said “Yes I agree, I wanted to kill my ex-boyfriend” and she laughed but the ten commandment questions really opened up the conversation. We shared the gospel and ask her to repent and believe in Jesus Christ, she kind of said “yes” but without certainty so we asked her to think about this good news during this Christmas season as Christmas is about this news and she promised to do so. Please pray for her so that she can truly believe in Jesus Christ be saved. 

From Huy Do:

two important discussions were wrought that took a very long time. The first one was with a lady named “Gem”, who had grown up Italian Roman Catholic, but had since left the faith, she is now a “new age” person. During the conversation she was kindly confronted with the reality of man’s sins and the ineffectiveness of most religions to deal with this, on this she agreed on the unimaginable legalistic burdens that the world religion impose upon its followers. But she was surprised at the exclusivity of the Gospel, how it contradicts what she had learned in Roman Catholicism. That she does not have to, nor is she able to obey the perfect laws of God in order to attain for herself the necessary legal merits to inherit eternal life, but that God had already provided the perfect legal merit for her to do so, Jesus Christ. By the end, she was quite angry and convicted, may the Lord change her heart. The second conversation was with a man named Wayland, he states that he is an agnostic, afterwards, a lengthy intellectual discussion took place, by the end, the Gospel was preached, he was not convicted but still do pray that God would do so with his heart.

And Finally, this week we had 3 new people who joined us ! Please pray for them as you can see in the photos !

                                                    

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Continuing from my last log entry, after the gospel + abortion outreach on Friday morning, three of us went to open air preach in Cathedral Square at lunch time.

Marty preached first and attracted an early heckler who was ignored.  But soon after, an old lady walked through and stopped to listen to the gospel.  She was bold, and decided to go to the preachers defense!  She took on the heckler (see photo) who soon left!  Marty was left to preach in peace.  :)

In the afternoon, another team of three were in Cashel Mall (Roger instead of Marty).  I had a stand out conversation with a young man who was with his parents (I suppose) - he was keen to try the flip chart, but his parents couldn’t stop.  The mum just smiled, and said for me to take him through it…  It turns out he had a church background, but he wasn’t right with God.  He became very uncomfortable when we were talking about hell (I was too when I was his age before I was saved).  And so this conversation was a wake up call for him.  And then he revealed that he was recovering from cancer!  No wonder his Mum wanted him to talk to me - his parents are no doubt praying for his salvation.  He understood the gospel.

I was exhausted and on my own for the Friday evening outreach, but God helped me through and I ended up having wonderful gospel opportunities, three in particular: two of which were follow ups.

One was with a young man struggling with addiction.  I was glad to hear he had been in rehab, but then sad to hear that he had just left.  He desperately needs the gospel and so I did my best to continue to share it with him.  I will continue to pray for him.

The last was with two catholic high school students who I shared the gospel with about four months ago.  It was a long follow up, where I continued to reinforce the gospel message they had heard.  They have contact cards for my church.

On Sunday a team of four were at the corner of Cashel & Colombo for a couple of hours.  But before I arrived, just after leaving my car, I had a wonderful opportunity to share the gospel with 3 guys.  They all got my checking question (so what do you have to do to go to heaven?) correct on the first try.  They each said part of the answer: “trust”, “Jesus”, “paid the fine for my sin” - I was impressed.

After the outreach had started, I had a wonderful conversation with two young ladies.  It turns out one of them was getting baptised tonight!  And she had a good understanding of the gospel, and helped me share it with her friend, who isn’t a Christian but didn’t want to go to hell.  She understood the gospel and took a follow up “After Life” tract.  She is going to church tonight to witness her friends baptism.  Oh that she understands and accepts the gospel message too!

Later I was able to catch up with yet another old workmate - his wife took tracts.  And then a conversation with a German tourist who appreciated the conversation and “found it really interesting”.

Well it’s been a really long week (for some reason) - really looking forward to a rest tomorrow!  Thank you Jesus :)
 

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As per usual, the Christchurch (NZ) team were at the bus stops on Thursday: Eastgate then Northlands.

It was a difficult start with an older man dumbfounded that anyone would believe in God.  He was hostile.  And he denied that Jesus existed; but wouldn’t engage intellectually claiming I didn’t have the academic credentials!  Very arrogant.  We disengaged and he went to sit in the bus shelter.  About five minutes later, I had the pleasure of circling back to offer tracts to the others sitting in the shelter.  The lady sitting right next to Mr. Arrogant was very pleasant and appreciative of receiving the good news.

I wasn’t deterred and spent four hours at Eastgate having many gospel conversations.  I was very encouraged to have a follow up with a guy who had talked to one of the team about four months prior.

At Northlands, two follow ups also stand out.

The first was with a young man who seemed to be seriously contemplating the gospel.  He had questions about: what church services were like, how we talked to God, and how God spoke to us.  I encouraged him to start reading his Bible and invited him to church - but I made it clear that more important than that, he needed to consider the cost of following Jesus, and to place his trust in His sacrifice before it’s too late.

The second was with another young man who was very keen to talk.  He went through the law with me, and then I asked him if he knew anyone who was perfect and willing to pay his fine.  His face lit up and he said: “Jesus died on the cross to take away our sins” (or something like that).  I was surprised how perceptive he was and figured he had a Christian background, but it turns out that Andy had shared the gospel with him the week prior!  He had really good questions and he really enjoyed the “crossing the road” and “fireman” analogies - they really seemed to help his understanding of the gospel, faith and repentance.  He accepted a Bible and seemed really keen to start reading it.  Praise God.

Friday saw the usual four outreaches: gospel + abortion outreach in the morning, open air preaching in Cathedral Square at lunch time, Cashel Mall in the afternoon, and then the Evening outreach in the city.

The gospel + abortion outreach was very eventful.  There was a team of four.

I had a lady (and her husband, I presume) approach me.  She seemed upset, and calmly explained that she needed to vent.  I held my breath, expecting the worst - when she surprised me.  She started sharing about her grief of a loved one who was very sick in hospital - she simply needed to talk to someone to help process what she was experiencing.  I told her there was hope for eternal life, and she accepted a tract.  But, sadly, she didn’t stay to talk further.  May she read and understand the tract and get in touch.

But I was able to share the law and the gospel with another young man later on.

And Andy had a wonderful long conversation with a young man - he was sitting on the wall outside the hospital - and so Andy approached him.  After some time, he went into the hospital, but then he came back out and continued the conversation with Andy for a long time.  He accepted a Bible.

To finish off, we had some serious opposition.  A guy with a lady pushing a pram, came right up to me and wanted to know what we were doing - I was up front with him and he became very angry and mocking.  In the meantime, Sonya had started talking with the lady, and was offering her a tract, when the man grabbed it and screwed it up and threw it on the ground.  Everytime one of the guys on the team tried to engage with him, he became angrier.  He wasn’t being rational.  He came over to Andy and tried to take his tracts - which Andy politely refused him from doing.  He then had a go at Marty, swiping his sign out of his hands.  It was at this point that I told everyone to ignore him and stop responding - to allow him to vent and leave.  Which he did thankfully.  We were all safe and fine.  But it was a reminder of the strong feelings the issue of abortion and the reality of God stirs up.  This is why we are there!  It is encouraging to know we are reaching people and being effective.  Please continue to pray for the Christchurch (NZ) team as we bring the hope of the gospel to the issue of abortion outside the hospital.  All glory to God.

I will share about the other three outreaches in my next log entry (tomorrow).
 

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The weather was great once again !, It is truly God’s grace that the weather has been so good during outreach hours. There were lots of people despite being Tuesday evening. three of us gathered and shared the word and prayed for the evangelism. 

As it is Christmas season, we took the advantage of it by asking “what do you think about Christmas?” and also It gave us opportunity to easily start the conversation naturally.

One of the highlight was the conversation that I had with very devoted Muslim named Saat, he was about 25 years old and he was ready with answers and questions to prove that Jesus is not GOD and Jesus did not actually died on the cross by sighting Quran so I spent around 45 minutes with him where Jesus himself claimed that He was God and why the death on the cross and resurrection is so crucial for our forgiveness and justification and also for God to stay just and loving at the same time. Saat did listened carefully and read the bible verses that were sighted to him but at last he said "bible is not in its original language so it cannot be trusted” It seemed like Saat really dislike the idea of God being man becoming sacrifice and that it is not our righteous act but it is God’s grace that saves us so that God receive all the credit. It was clear that Saat was quite frustrated and at times raised his voice but he promised to think about it. So please pray for Saat. 

Finally, I met a lady called Mary, when I opened up the conversation she kept on mentioning “I am not the right person to talk to” but when her eternity was questioned she engaged into conversation. Gospel was shared and she said that she would think about it. So please pray for Mary as well.

From Huy Do who joined the evangelism:- 

It is nearing Christmas, people reacted better than expected, Christmas season provides a great opportunity to talk about why it is that Jesus was born and why was that birth so significant. One great highlight of evangelism was a conversation with a young student from Singapore by the name of Joseph. He was asked the question of “what makes it so significant about a man born in a manger that we have to celebrate His birth 2000 years later?”. The question, along with his answer provides a wonderful opportunity to share with him the Gospel. He was convicted of his sins and was provided with a way out of his sins, with salvation through the Gospel, please pray that God would change his heart.

Soli Deo Gloria ! who sustains us and give sufficient grace everyday to glorify and enjoy Him by preaching the gospel

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I found the need to pace myself on Tuesday (Riccarton) and Wednesday (Cashel Mall & Cathedral Square) - only having the energy to let people come to me, rather than being as active in getting gospel conversations started.  So I was relying heavily on my flip chart and tracts.  But God was faithful in bringing people along who were keen to talk.  It was great having Roger with me on Tuesday, as per usual.

Two great conversations on the Tuesday.

The first was with a young man on his gap year away from home: the south of the USA.  He had a disdain for Christianity, which he grew up with a form of.  Yet he was “open”.  He didn’t appreciate the basic apologetics I used explaining why there must be an afterlife - it was too simple - and life is full of grey (or so the excuse goes).  But I took him through the law and the gospel as usual.  I was also able to mix in some of my testimony which had similarities to his life.

The second was with three kids from Christchurch Boys High School.  They all heard the law and the gospel too, and then we circled back to discuss the reality of God's existence - two of which were very resistant to.

I’m trusting that the gospel is the power of God for salvation in spite of the resistance encountered in these conversations.

The first outreach on Wednesday was in Cashel Mall.  There were lots of people out and about, and there was even a brass band playing Christmas carols further down the mall - very pleasant.

I had a wonderful gospel conversation with a young kiwi guy sandwiched between two conversations with guys from India.  The first Indian guy just couldn’t grasp that salvation was a gift, and kept reverting back to thinking he had to be a good person to go to heaven.  In contrast the second Indian guy understood grace clearly from the get go.

But the conversation with the kiwi guy was special.  He had a catholic background and was confident he would be going to heaven until he tried the good person test.  I could tell he was quite impacted by the law, and it was a joy to share the good news with him.  For some reason I told him I had been to Pakistan to watch cricket, and this accelerated his interest, as he is a budding cricket player and had recently been in Sri Lanka for cricket.  It turns out that, not only had he been in Christchurch when the Mosque shootings occurred, but he was in Colombo when the church was bombed!  He explained how he had to move south and go into lock down for three weeks!  He has been close to the stench (figuratively) of death, and now he has heard the hope of eternal life, only found in Jesus.  I hope to see him in the Black Caps one day - more importantly, I hope to see him in heaven one day too.

The Cashel Mall outreach ended with a difficult conversation with a very drunk homeless guy.  In the end, I was keen for him to move on - but he took tracts.  I hope he reads them when he is sober.  And I hope to see him again soon to follow up with him.

After lunch, I was in Cathedral Square.  I set up my flip chart, but I noticed a (homeless) guy I’ve talked to multiple times before sitting in the distance - so I went over to follow up.  I’m glad I did, because not only did I have an opportunity to get to know him better, but he had multiple sets of friends come past and I had opportunities to share the gospel with all of them (some of them pictured walking away after the last conversation).  And the original guy took keen interest every time I did.  I pretty much spent the whole two hours with these various groups of people - except at one time where two girls were working their way through the flip chart on their own, before I headed over to explain it to them (they seemed quite impacted).  One of the groups were also friends with a whole other group of people I regularly have gospel opportunities with.  I’m really starting to get to know certain people out on the streets of Christchurch.  Plenty of fuel for my prayer time.  I wish I could convert all these people - but that is out of my hands.  All I can do is share the gospel, pray, and continue to be friendly and meet them where they are at.  Salvation is of the Lord.
 

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Battle Log for Toowong Village : December 10, 2019 , 1330 -
1500

Today we had four team members to join. Although it appeared a quieter week as it is UQ graduation week and last week of school term so there might be still plenty of opportunities but not anymore next weeks onward. Someone suggested we can break from next week onward and resume sometime in mid January ready for the new school term. But Col and Gary opined we should give it a go at least for one more week.

Even there will be less UQ students but God's work is unfathomable. Actually, one of my divine encounter to day tells that God always has special work in people hearts beyond our comprehension that however need our obedience commitment to catch those divine kairos moment.
Today, all of us still have opportunity for reaching out. As for me, I had eight divine encounters on record as follows with 3 Chinese, 3 Aussie, 1 European, 1 Nepalese: -

1 & 2) One of the work here is to reconnect with people you had conversation before. So I reconnected with 王健明 of whom was talked up to by Winnie a month ago. I also reconnected with Joe the atheist. I believed these are part of the work of God to get them exposed to His work of grace through our ongoing contact with words of warm concern and encouragement.

3) Then I caught up with a first year UQ female student. She got a Christmas Message card from Col but did not stop to chat. Instead she kept walking to the Bus stop. I approached her with the Chinese tract which she willingly received and we started chatting.

I was amazed to find out that this was the first time she received a tract on the street. She told me she actually saw me and other OPN 513 people both in Toowong and in Sunnybank. However, she had all along been determined enough to keep rejecting to accept any tract as she was afraid to talk about religion and and heavy issues about life. Yet, miraculously, God opened her heart this time to not only taking our tract for the first time, but entered into a conversation withe me at ease. I was able to share full gospel to her.

But her initial question to me was that if we have got paid for doing this. I told here on the opposite, we have to pay buying tracts and volunteer our time to reach out to strangers on the street. I used it to demonstrate how a true faith will change our world view and value system to focus on eternal rather than temporal matters. I continued to share my own testimony how God changed my life objective guiding me to shift my priority from achievement of this world to accomplishment of God's work that would last in eternity. Our 15 -20 minutes chat was ended when her bus came.

4) Old Aussie man took my tract and was open to talk. Just only have time for a quick sharing of the nutshell of the gospel but our conversation was cut short by the arrival of the bus.

5) An European looked UQ student appeared humble to let me walk him to the bus stop and listen to the gospel but it was cut short by the bus.

6) I have another long chat with Joy from Main Land China. She first received a tract from Col and walked on to cross the road for bus to the city. I handed her Chinese Tract and successfully started a conversation. She listened to my gospel sharing with interest. Then she told me she became a half Christian through a Taiwanese Pastor in the campus just falling short of a Baptism.

So this was obviously an incorrect understanding that needs more clarification but than the bus came and I had to spent time to help her to clarify with the bus driver the way to connect her to Sunnybank as such our conversation had to end. I pray that her faith in Christ will be straightened soon by the grace of God.

7) Lisa an UQ student from Nepal. She was very polite to accept my tract and was cooperative to let me share with her the gospel. Again the bus came just too quick that I could only manage to share the nutshell of the gospel.

8) An Aussie girl took the tract and read it right away before the bus came.

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God gave us a very warm day at Redcliffe for outreach but we were able to find a shady tree on the footpath and a breeze off the water helped a lot.

We had 4 team members Richard, Hannah Andrew and Col. After prayer it did not take long before the team was involved in many gospel conversations.

Redcliffe is a friendly place to witness and every time we go out God is softening the hearts of those he is drawing to himself.

Everyone was very encouraged by the end of our outreach and all praise and honour to our Lord Jesus who gave us the opportunity to proclaim the gospel.

Please pray for the many we spoke to, that all will consider their eternal peril and put their trust in Christ.

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Why didn't I think of this: Jesus ascension was necessary to prove that our human nature was now fit to abide in God's presence Because T. V. Moore had already published this insight in 1858. Praise God for the insights He gives to various leaders at various times.

     We had a willing team of 6 today. There seemed to be more Buddhists around than usual but none of the contacts seemed to lead to serious questions. Only one couple did the whole flip chart . He reckoned he would get into heaven even though he admitted to lying and lusting. Anyways they heard about the Substitutionary Atonement and know they need to trust the Lord Jesus Christ alone. Others were more open to learning more about God but showed no urgency in the matter. 

     There was M., a R.C. man from Portugal who heard the Good News but seemed to be stuck in self-love and pride about his own goodness. 

     There was D. who had been praying to god and when he parted company, he had a Bible and was excited. 

     There was P., a  Greek Orthodox man, who would only say that at death one is buried. However, after refusing to take anything from Ryan or myself, he freely chatted with Paul as they strolled away for quite some time.

      There was 2 'first-timer' J.W.  young ladies who were well trained in causing confusion but they were challenged enough by the truth presented to them so as to close off the chat with our 2 ladies. 

     Fynn also had a long chat but as always we have to leave all these contacts in God's prayerful keeping.

     It was a wonderful time of teamwork and we give God all the glory knowing that no labor in the Lord is in vain. Yes! We went home rejoicing. 

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This Saturday, the weather was great and pleasant. There were many people out in the Melbourne city to enjoy the weather and the Christmas decorations in the city. 

As usual we gathered at Starbucks and shared the word and prayed together before the evangelism. By God’s grace seven of us came out for evangelism.  

There were many interesting conversations. We met with three teenage boys; they claimed themselves to be atheist and do not believe in GOD. So, we asked simple apologetic questions like 'how we know that there are builders for the buildings and painter for the painting etc.', and surprisingly they responded positively to the questions and started to show interest in the conversation. The Gospel was shared and they understood the need of saviour for their sinful and dead state. One of the guys seemed quite offended and did not like the truth that we are sinful man heading to hell. However, it was quite clear that he was convinced and started to struggle whether this Gospel is ‘real’. 

We also had exciting conversations with Muslims. One of them was Sam. Sam was from Iran and he came to Melbourne with a working holiday visa. We started by telling him how Jesus in the Quran and Jesus in the Bible seems like similar person, but it is very different in essence, and we shared about the necessity of Jesus’ death on the cross and resurrection and deity of Christ Jesus. Although some Muslims looked uncomfortable with idea Jesus being ‘GOD’ they seemed challenged with the message of good news.

Lastly, there was a person who seemed bit drunk or drug affected. When we approached him and started the conversation he said that he is a really bad person and that it seems like he will never be able to go to heaven. It seemed like he was really broken inside and did not see any hope for his sinful state so we shared that Jesus came for who came for the sick who sees the need for the doctor, that Jesus came to call the sinners not those who thinks they are righteous (Mark 2:17). We forgot his name but please remember him in prayer. 

Overall, all seven of us had really good encounters. Praise Jesus for using unworthy servants like us! Please pray for those people who heard the gospel so that they may repent and put their trust in Jesus Christ. And please join us for evangelism as it is Christmas season, such a good season to start up the conversation about Jesus Christ. 

                                                   

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