On Saturday, made some more progress in my S. Providence district. Hoping to get it finished before it gets too cold.
Beech St. (changed) has a lot of history for me. It was there I met a Liberian who seemed like he was just waiting for a fisher of men to come after him. In the same building now is a refugee family of the Karen tribe from Southeast Asia. One of the young Liberians in our church had invited the daughter, a good friend of hers, to church some time back and came for a number of weeks. And a Congolese family that live next door, very dear Christian people, worshipped with us regularly for some nine months. They are living stones amid the rubble of sin and misery.
Saturday was no disappointment. Above our Congolese friends is a small Somali family. The young man, a Muslim, was very polite and listened to the Gospel of the “Lamb of God” who takes away the sin of the world. Above them we met a single Iraqi woman, also Muslim, complete with prayer carpet and ornately decorated Qu’ran lying out. She was clearly needy, in more ways than one. A lonely soul who needed friends, and of course, the Friend who sticks closer than a brother. We spoke of the story of Joseph (“Yousef” as she recalled from the Qu’ran), and how he was lonely and abandoned, yet not abandoned by God. And we shared that he was a picture of the Christ to come, who would be abandoned by his friends that He might die and redeem them. We got her contact information and hope to follow up with her on some practical levels – and hopefully she continues to be open to the Gospel.
Please pray for our new Muslim friends. Pray that God would open their hearts to Jesus, the True Asylum from those on the run.
Please also pray for a special evangelistic meeting we are holding within walking distance of their homes on Nov. 3. It will be held in English with Spanish translation.
Update. It’s been a number of months since this post. During that time, my wife and I have visited our female Iraqi friend, Fatima (changed), a number of times, and had her over for dinner with another sister in the church. We were able to help her get a stable job, though she’s looking for something better. She lets us read the Bible to her with comment, and she’s come to church once. Please pray that she would see the beauty and glory of ‘Isa (Jesus) as the Son of God and Savior of the world.
When I first met Pastor Reaves, he had just finished mowing. I didn’t know this, because he came into the house wearing a tie. He shared with me later that he did this so that he would be ready in case he got a call to the hospital. I would also learn soon that a visit to the hospital with him, in this town of about 9,000, could turn into an all-day event. That is not because he overstayed his welcome. On the contrary, he seemed to know just how long to stay, usually less than 15 minutes. No, it was because he visited so many patients.
Went out in my nearby Lakewood parish Friday. Very encouraging overall. First, approached a couple of fellows who were talking in their driveway. Not wanting to interrupt, I handed them my literature. “Don’t let me interrupt you … unless you’re open to talking religion!” Well, they were. The one fellow, a 40-something biker type with a braided beard, told me that Christianity was suspect, having come down to us through the ages through oral tradition. He didn’t mention the telephone game illustration, but that was the gist of it. I explained to him and his friend the radical concern the early Christians had in bearing witness to the truth. Eventually, I gave the great ‘for instance’ in Saul of Tarsus. Open enemy. Jihadi type. A card-carrying, high profile Jew who hated the Christians. Then he claimed he witnessed the risen Christ, then began “preaching the faith he once destroyed.” At the very least, we should sit up and take notice. I invited him to church, and he indicated that I would probably see him someday.
West Port Experiment 