Thursday, January 28th, 2016
Revive FLORIDA
Upon arrival at Revive this morning, I was met by a
disappointed friend whose first time out evangelizing was not quite what she
expected!
“Shake it off, sister!” I
exhorted. “Every encounter is different and
every team leader has a little bit different way of going about things. Jump on my team! We’ll
experience this together!”
She smiled and agreed to give it another go. Mustering up her faith, she had a
little talk with Jesus and decided to see what team He selected for her for
round 2.
She started out with another group, but lo and behold, she
ended up with me. Her original
team didn’t quite have enough members, so it was split up and she was directed
to join us: Rhonda, Jeremy, Laura and Me!
It was a morning outreach, so our task was to visit a church
and pray with the leadership there.
Upon arrival, however, we found ourselves in what appeared to be an
abandoned church parking lot. It
was obvious that no one was home – except for this one man, sitting on a wrought
iron bench just to the side of the church building.
We wondered, “ Was he the pastor of this church
having a time of meditation?
As we got out of the car, the man immediately rose from his
place of solitude and began to apologize for sitting on the bench. How funny! He thought we were part of the church staff and we thought
he was the pastor. His name was
Craig and he explained to us that he was on a walk to the local corner store
and just stopped half way to take a rest.
Craig was not having a good morning, to say the least. As we shot the breeze with him, we
discovered that someone – a friend that he owed some money to – swiped his car
this morning and the story just went downhill from there. Craig’s feet were very swollen and
afflicted – that’s why he was sitting down resting. We explained to Craig who we were and asked if we could pray
with him.
He welcomed a
talk with God!
After praying we gave Craig the bracelet to commemorate our
time together and asked if he had time for us to explain the colors and what
they meant. He did!
Step by step, we took him through the gospel message. At the end we inquired,
“Craig, Is there anything
preventing you from
declaring Jesus Christ as
Lord, right now?”
“No, not at all.” He responded.
The next thing I knew, we were huddling together praying in
that parking lot. At first, I laid
my hand on Craig’s shoulder, but I saw that Rhonda had plain out grabbed Craig’s
other hand, so I grabbed for Craig’s hand as well. There we were joined together in a complete circle, our eyes
closed, coming before God with a very special request.
Craig asked
Christ to come into his heart
and life right
there!
We chatted a while longer, celebrating with our new friend
and brother-in-Christ, and took a selfie to remember the moment. Craig had to get going, so we waved to
him as he left the parking lot.
Our team grouped together for a quick debrief – really, we
were just so excited about Craig’s conversion that we couldn’t stop chattering
amongst ourselves! We took one
final look at Craig as he headed down the road. He was not the same man we met an hour earlier. His whole demeanor was different. His face glowed – it was lit up with
wonder and joy! He even had a spring in his step. We hadn’t even realized til
then that God had healed his feet.
How awesome is that?
I texted Craig later in the day and here’s what he said,
“Thank you so much! When
we were all holding hands,
I felt something powerful.
I know God is with me now.
Thanks for everything! God
bless you!”
Wow! Now that’s what Revive FLORIDA is all
about –
Connecting
people with Christ!
My friend Rhonda wasn’t discouraged anymore! Within days, she, herself, became a team
captain for Revive. Infact, all
the team members did!
That moment in
the parking lot changed us all.
There’s a new
name written down in glory!
Gail
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