A Jew, A Muslim, and a Casualty from Religion

Saints,

Evangelizing in the Boston Subways was AMAZING last week! And not just in a “this is what you always say after a day of working for the Lord” way, but in a “serious supernatural things happened” way.

I want to highlight three people who stood out from my time ministering in the subways last week. Please keep them in prayer.

• Richard: Subway ministry occurs in phases. When a new train comes in, and the doors open, hundreds of people come racing out of the trains and head towards the stairs. Aaron Wentz (OAC Boston Director) and I stand by the stairs and offer gospel booklets to the people going by. The booklet we use the most is entitled “Where Will You Spend Eternity?” and people take thousands of them.

  This leads me to Richard. Richard took a booklet from Aaron, and turned around, came back to him, and said, “Hi, I’m Jewish, and I’ve been thinking a lot about eternity lately. Can you tell me more?”

  Aaron has been doing this for 15 years, and he said to me he has NEVER encountered someone who is Jewish be so open and so eager to talk about Jesus. We both agreed it was God’s miracle that out of all the 15 years, me, a Jewish Christian, was there and I had in my pocket my freshly-printed pamphlet called “A Jew and His God” that has my story of how I came to faith. I chatted with Richard and gave him my pamphlet, which he was eager to take. (You can see the A Jew and His God pamphlet by clicking here.)

  Please pray that Richard contacts me, but more importantly, pray that he comes to saving faith in the true Messiah, Jesus, so he can be a completed and forgiven Jew!

• A Muslim Woman: Since we literally run into people from so many different countries, we try to be prepared with literature for everyone. It is very common to run into Muslims, so we carry The Gospel of Luke in Arabic and give them out. Aaron told me that “In-jeel” is Arabic for “gospel” and if you hand out an Arabic Gospel of Luke, and say “In-jeel,” then often Muslims will take them.

  During one of the times when a train let out, there were so many people walking by and tons of people were taking our booklets. I saw a Muslim woman (I could tell by the type of head-scarf), I fumbled a bit to find my Arabic Gospel of Luke booklets, and by the time I did, the woman had gotten a bit far away. Still, I said, “Excuse me, Ma’am, In-jeel?” When I said “In-jeel” she stopped, looked back at me, walked back to where I was, smiled, took the Gospel of Luke in her language, and nodded as if to say “Thank you.”

  I praised God! You don’t have to be a fancy evangelist to say “In-jeel with a smile.” Sadly, I didn’t get this woman’s name because of the language barrier, but she got God’s Word in her language!!! How cool is that? I can’t get over how good God is!

• Amy: When the trains leave, and there’s a waiting period for the new train, that’s when we deliver a short open-air message, and then chat with whoever is interested. There often are many who are. Aaron was sharing the gospel using a “rope trick” and I noticed a young lady watching him intently. When his presentation was done, Aaron asked her what she thought of what he had to say. She told us she grew up hearing this and knew all about it, but has, in her words, “decided to walk away from Jesus.”

  I ended up speaking with her for about 10 or 15 minutes. Her name is Amy, and she described an upbringing of religious oppression, religious hypocrisy, and looking down on others for not being as “spiritual” as her family. She said her brother had a nervous breakdown, and her parents ignored it. She said she had 8PM bedtime even as a senior in high school. She said her family often pointed at people they thought were “sinners” with derision.

  It didn’t take a genius to discern that Amy was very hurt. I noticed she’d often twitch when I mentioned Jesus. I tried to speak very kindly to her and offer to her that the Jesus of the Bible lovingly reaches out to those who are sinful (all of us), not in derision, but with the offer of salvation and adoption. She was very visibly uncomfortable when I spoke of Jesus. She reminded me a bit like a person who was in an abusive relationship, and as a result, has difficulty with anything that reminds them of that abuse.

  I begged her to consider the true Jesus, and healing comes only in Him. Healing not only from religious oppression, but healing from her own sin against God, and that she could be completely washed clean and made a child of God.

  In time her friend arrived, and she used that as an excuse to leave the conversation. She wouldn’t take any of our materials. My heart breaks for Amy. There’s so much hurt in this sinful fallen world. People should never be hurt in the name of Jesus, yet sadly it happens a lot. These are the people we run into in the subways. Real people with real issues. All of them needing their sins forgiven. And all of them needing to be discipled and nurtured in Christ.

Thank you for reading through this update. Please do pray for these and the many others who heard the only life-giving message – the gospel of Jesus Christ!

Here are a few photos. I’m not in any of them since I was holding the camera. But you can get a feel for what it’s like down there in the subways. God bless you!

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