Saturday, September 06, 2008

Dinosaurs, Pride, and Rebellion

It has been a while since I have blogged here. A few months actually, but I wanted to just post an evangelistic adventure that I had at the Tallahassee Mall in July. I do not do much evangelism in the mall, but the times that I have done it have been enjoyable. It makes me nervous when I think about but It is a great place to proclaim the gospel of Jesus as long as the authorities do not try to throw you out ;).

Back in July I went to the Tallahassee Mall with a Pastor do spread information about church services and to do some evangelism. We prayed in the car and then proceeded to head into the mall. As soon as we got to the entrance we approached a young woman smoking a cigarette and invited her to church. I wanted to ask her if she would go to heaven if she died that night, but I did not muster the courage to do so. She was friendly however, said that she was looking for a church. After we talked with her a bit we walked into the mall and saw four teenage boys talking amongst themselves. My Pastor began a conversation with them, and almost immediately one of the boys said that he was an agnostic one of the others said that he only goes to church during the holidays. My Pastor started to explain to him about the main theme of the Bible. the truth of the gospel of Jesus Christ and why we believe that it is true. The Agnostic then brought up dinosaurs and questioned whether or not they are written in the Bible, but it seemed to us almost like a smoke screen. Then he said that he did not want to be controlled by anything. He wanted to be in control of his own life and did not want the Bible of God dictating the way that he lives his life. That seemed like the root of his unbelief. We reasoned with him some more and told him to consider the things that were spoken to him.

We then continued to walk through mall and approached a jeweler. He said that he already went to a church, so I asked him if he would go to heaven if he died, to which he quickly responded, "I can't talk about that on my job". We courteously said goodbye and told him to have a good day. He seemed like a nice man. Next we saw a man dressed in bicycler's clothing sitting on a bench. I extended to him an invitation to the church service and he refused it saying that he did not have any pockets. Then I asked him if he would go to heaven if he died and he looked at me with a prideful stare and he burst out with laughter. He said that the Bible was a myth and I spent the next 45 minutes trying to reason with him and the gospel was declared to him as well. He was full of pride and said that he used to believe what we believed until he got educated. I continued to patiently reason with him with a smile on my face and with gentleness, but he kept insisting that what we believe is foolishness! I eventually proclaimed the gospel to him and our conversation ended.

So why did I call this post, Dinosaurs, Pride, and Rebellion? Because that is what we came across at the mall. However, my time there reinforced the fact that we can witness anywhere and most of the time people are willing to talk to us about spiritual things. We must make ourselves available and step off in faith and initiate. God is faithful, He will be with us, and He will empower us (Acts 1:8)! Trust Him and go!

4 comments:

That Hank said...

I can't imagine going into a public place to push your mythology on people. You can't reason someone into believing in your god - the belief in god is not reasonable. Folks who believe do so for emotional reasons, not intellectual ones.

Samuel said...

Hello downtown guy,

I see that you are from Tallahassee as well. So am I.I see that you are replying to my posts about my experience at the mall.

I would have to disagree with you about believing in God as being unreasonable. It is very reasonable to believe in God as well as the Bible. I don't want to believe in anything blindly, and I would suppose that most people would agree. The Bible is God's book to mankind and the book itself proves its divine authorship through prophecy and God proves His existence through creation. I believe that both of these are good reasons to believe in God and the Bible.

That Hank said...

I'm sorry, but I have never seen a shred of actual evidence to back up the existence of any gods or a divine authorship of any bible.

Samuel said...

Here is the evidence. Prophecy. It was prophesied where Jesus Christ, who is the Son of God, would be born which was Bethlehem (Micah 5:2), how he would die which was through being pierced hand and foot (Psalm 22), what he would be called which is Immanuel (Isaiah 7:14), he would rise from the dead (Psalm 2), he would be betrayed for thirty pieces of silver (Zechariah 11:12-13), and that he would die for our sins (Isaiah 53).

All of these prophecies which were made anywhere from 400 to 1000 years before the life of Christ came true in His life. It is absurd to think that people just happened to guess this, so the only other logical explanation is that this revelation is from God Himself. And we can that God exists He says through the existence of creation. He says,

"For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse." Romans 1:20

My friend you don't have an excuse to say that there is no God and the prophecy points to the Bible's divine authorship. Please consider these things because the Bible says,

"Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, for the Wrath of God remains on him." John 3:36

The wrath of God is on you because of your sin, please consider this! Trust Jesus!!

Sincerely,
Samuel