If preaching the gospel aloud inside a hospital counts as open air preaching then I open air preached for the first time in my life yesterday! Glory be to God!!
The first Sunday of every month we go to Robert Reid Children's Hospital to pray for the children and their mother, to evangelize, and give away cookies and juice to children and sometimes to both children and mom. Every Tuesday the week before we have a general meeting in which we pray for the ministry, for everybody who's participating, and if there are special prayer requests we include them in the prayer as well, we discuss which verse(s) we will be sharing with them and Flora, the leader of the ministry, updates us on any child we wanted to follow-up after the last visit.
After much prayer I decided I wanted to preach this time and so last Tuesday when Flora was assigning the different tasks to people, she asked Marisol to preach and since I wanted to be on Marisol's team Flora put me on her team AND made it clear that I was going to be preaching as well with Marisol! I was quite nervous but nodded in agreement. Needless to say I prayed for boldness and courage I also prayed that the gospel would be preached correctly and that souls would be saved. Because I like to write so much I did a little outline on what I would be preaching from the verses we were to be sharing with the people at the hospital.
The verses were, from Romans my all-time favorite, Romans 6:23, 3:23, 5:8, but sometimes things don't go as planned, as Christians we should all know that while we make our plans the Lord we serve is Sovereign, I forgot my outline at home and the notepad I was planning on taking to write down the names of the children I wanted Flora to follow up, but I had read the outline and the verses so many times before that I can safely say the Holy Spirit engraved it in my heart and mind.
We got to the hospital, as usual gathered in a circle on the parking lot and prayed. We divided into teams and divided the cookies and juices in bags so that each team would get a bag of cookies and a bag of juices. Our team got the right wing of the third floor but we ended up taking the left wing, Marisol preached on the first 2 rooms of 12-18 beds and I got the other two rooms. A revival didn't break loose and people didn't fall on the floor crying in repentance but the gospel was preached and the seed was planted, there were a few kids and mothers who seemed receptive I only pray that the may be saved.
The Lord is so good! and I say that because, well its true, this is truly an honor and a blessing to be able to freely preach the gospel without being stoned, mocked, or persecuted. Not only that but we get to glorify God through the preaching of the gospel and souls are saved!
Other things happened at this monthly visit. Because I live in a nation that endorses idolatry and superstition a lot of these mothers or family of the patients have their children wear these red bracelets called Azabache, its basically a red bracelet with a black rock (the azabache) which hangs from it, that supposedly has magical powers and protects against evil spirits (the irony of it) and so it is quite the battle when going to share about Christ to confront these mothers and tell them that it is wrong in the eyes of the Lord, that they're putting their faith in an idol when they should be putting their faith in Christ, and that they're opening doors to the evil spirits those things are supposed to protect their children from. Well during our visit one of the other groups had such an encounter and by the grace of God the mother took the bracelet off of her child, she claimed her mother had put it on her child.
Please pray for the children of this hospital and their families who heard the gospel, pray for their healing and for the ministry I belong to at church, thanks in advanced!
The first Sunday of every month we go to Robert Reid Children's Hospital to pray for the children and their mother, to evangelize, and give away cookies and juice to children and sometimes to both children and mom. Every Tuesday the week before we have a general meeting in which we pray for the ministry, for everybody who's participating, and if there are special prayer requests we include them in the prayer as well, we discuss which verse(s) we will be sharing with them and Flora, the leader of the ministry, updates us on any child we wanted to follow-up after the last visit.
After much prayer I decided I wanted to preach this time and so last Tuesday when Flora was assigning the different tasks to people, she asked Marisol to preach and since I wanted to be on Marisol's team Flora put me on her team AND made it clear that I was going to be preaching as well with Marisol! I was quite nervous but nodded in agreement. Needless to say I prayed for boldness and courage I also prayed that the gospel would be preached correctly and that souls would be saved. Because I like to write so much I did a little outline on what I would be preaching from the verses we were to be sharing with the people at the hospital.
The verses were, from Romans my all-time favorite, Romans 6:23, 3:23, 5:8, but sometimes things don't go as planned, as Christians we should all know that while we make our plans the Lord we serve is Sovereign, I forgot my outline at home and the notepad I was planning on taking to write down the names of the children I wanted Flora to follow up, but I had read the outline and the verses so many times before that I can safely say the Holy Spirit engraved it in my heart and mind.
We got to the hospital, as usual gathered in a circle on the parking lot and prayed. We divided into teams and divided the cookies and juices in bags so that each team would get a bag of cookies and a bag of juices. Our team got the right wing of the third floor but we ended up taking the left wing, Marisol preached on the first 2 rooms of 12-18 beds and I got the other two rooms. A revival didn't break loose and people didn't fall on the floor crying in repentance but the gospel was preached and the seed was planted, there were a few kids and mothers who seemed receptive I only pray that the may be saved.
The Lord is so good! and I say that because, well its true, this is truly an honor and a blessing to be able to freely preach the gospel without being stoned, mocked, or persecuted. Not only that but we get to glorify God through the preaching of the gospel and souls are saved!
Other things happened at this monthly visit. Because I live in a nation that endorses idolatry and superstition a lot of these mothers or family of the patients have their children wear these red bracelets called Azabache, its basically a red bracelet with a black rock (the azabache) which hangs from it, that supposedly has magical powers and protects against evil spirits (the irony of it) and so it is quite the battle when going to share about Christ to confront these mothers and tell them that it is wrong in the eyes of the Lord, that they're putting their faith in an idol when they should be putting their faith in Christ, and that they're opening doors to the evil spirits those things are supposed to protect their children from. Well during our visit one of the other groups had such an encounter and by the grace of God the mother took the bracelet off of her child, she claimed her mother had put it on her child.
Please pray for the children of this hospital and their families who heard the gospel, pray for their healing and for the ministry I belong to at church, thanks in advanced!
4 comments:
This is so encouraging to read about. I love to rejoice when I see God fulfill answers to my prayers (like praying for more laborers to witness to people). So far, it happens quite often, but I am glad that you are doing ministry to these children and their moms. I really hope more believers will get revived and start doing the same, especially with the true gospel of grace. As we move closer to the end of the age, there is much more need for radical evangelism, because we will not always have the freedom we do now.
God bless you with an abundance of grace and peace in Christ Jesus our Lord.
P.S. Could I do a post on my AoG blog to promote your blog and your passion for evangelism? I did the same thing a few weeks ago with Stephanie's blog called "Thirsty Soul." Thanks,
Penn
I really hope more believers will get revived and start doing the same, especially with the true gospel of grace.
That has been my prayer since I began to evangelize more and came under conviction for not doing it more often and biblically!
P.S. Could I do a post on my AoG blog to promote your blog and your passion for evangelism? I did the same thing a few weeks ago with Stephanie's blog called "Thirsty Soul."
Absolutely! you have my permission to post/promote on your blog anything I write in my blog any time! Thank you for your kindness! :D
and may the Lord bless you as well Penn!
Thank you Rita.
I used to do open-air preaching regularly. I have'nt done any for a while though. It is kind of exhausting.
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