Day 15 - The Never Thirst Promotion
5:45 AM: Cell phone alarm clock goes off. Peter wakes up… hits snooze
5:50 AM: Peter gets up and jumps in the car with Aaron, Dave (Bethel student), Diego (Brazilian) and Ben (Steiger missionary from Minneapolis/Massachusetts) to head down to Wellington to setup our ‘Jesus stall’.
7:00 AM: We arrive at the school parking lot where the Gay and Lesbian fair was happening. We are some of the first people to arrive. The organizer questions our intentions and our beliefs about homosexuality. We explain that we want to share the love of Jesus for the Gay and Lesbian community by serving free water. She asks if we condone the lifestyle and we respond that we do not but that our intentions are not to preach this but to show love.
8 – 10 AM: We setup our stand right in the middle of the fair! Only 20 feet from the main stage! We had an amazing spot. Our little water stand was a simple sign that said ‘Jesus Stall, free water’ (they call the fair booths ‘stalls’). Since we setup so quickly we began to help the booths next to us setup. Many booths had little tents and displays that needed some extra hands. So we helped the Gay and Lesbian film festival, a person who made little insects out of glass and the government election registration committee. One of them asked if we were a cult and we said we were followers of Jesus and he said, “oh, a cult”. Other than that, they were very respectful and nice to us. It didn’t seem to bother them at all that we were there.
As people began to show up many would glance at our stall and walk away. So we started asking people if they wanted free water as they passed by. Many responded negatively just by their looks but as the day got hotter… and it did get hot… the water became very popular. In fact, this was the hottest day I have experienced in New Zealand so far. Praise God it happened today!
10 AM – 4 PM: By 11 o’clock Aaron and I had already made 2 trips to the grocery store for more cups and water. We were really distributing a lot of water at the fair. Each cup we gave out had “Whoever drinks the water I give with never thirst again –Jesus” handwritten on it. This made for a lot of work of writing on each cup and filling to keep up with demand. We also had a couple guys with a tray walking around serving people, including other stalls.
Soon people began to ask why we were doing this and we were able to explain our hearts to them. I had a guy walk up to me with a t-shirt that was from the NZ Humanist society. Their slogan was “Reason not Superstition”. He began telling me that he believed Christianity and the bible was a myth. That kicked off a 1.5 hour conversation about the historical credibility of the gospels, morality, other religions, suffering and free will and Jesus’ opinion of Gay and Lesbians. In the end I challenged him to investigate the claims the bible makes and the claims I was making about the bible and I also challenged him to ask Jesus to reveal Himself to him before he went to sleep tonight. He didn’t respond extremely well to those challenges but the conversation overall was very, very good! His name is Kent if you want to say a prayer for him.
During the time I was talking to Kent we had the mayor of Wellington come by our stall and also members of parliament. One of the parliament members said, “Wow, its great to see the church doing this!” People began to call our water ‘Jesus water’ and they began to call Diego ‘Jesus boy’. A couple guys from our team were interviewed by the local media and people were taking tons of pictures of our booth. What a greater image of the body of Christ than the images we see in the media with picket signs full of hate messages!
Other members of our team had spiritual conversations with people including a few Buddhists that had a stall there. Luke walked up the their stall and a Buddhist women began to tell him all about Buddhism. Luke listened very intently and asked questions and allowed her to speak. He could tell that she was very excited that she had an interested audience. Then, she asked him if he had any beliefs. Luke said he was a Christian and the woman responded, “What?! A Christian who actually listens? Well, then let me listen to your beliefs.” And Luke was able to freely share all about Jesus to her. Amazing when it’s invited!!
Back at our stall, we did have a couple people come and give us some strong words – but it was very rare.
4 PM: The fair closed and we began helping the organizers clean up. Our team was the only stall walking around with plastic gloves and garbage bags. We collected the garbage from the other stalls and helped some people take their stuff down. AND our cups, with the verse on them, were all over the fair grounds! It was so cool!
In the end we gave away over a thousand cups of water! Praise the Lord!
(I am praying for you showcase team!)
5:50 AM: Peter gets up and jumps in the car with Aaron, Dave (Bethel student), Diego (Brazilian) and Ben (Steiger missionary from Minneapolis/Massachusetts) to head down to Wellington to setup our ‘Jesus stall’.
7:00 AM: We arrive at the school parking lot where the Gay and Lesbian fair was happening. We are some of the first people to arrive. The organizer questions our intentions and our beliefs about homosexuality. We explain that we want to share the love of Jesus for the Gay and Lesbian community by serving free water. She asks if we condone the lifestyle and we respond that we do not but that our intentions are not to preach this but to show love.
8 – 10 AM: We setup our stand right in the middle of the fair! Only 20 feet from the main stage! We had an amazing spot. Our little water stand was a simple sign that said ‘Jesus Stall, free water’ (they call the fair booths ‘stalls’). Since we setup so quickly we began to help the booths next to us setup. Many booths had little tents and displays that needed some extra hands. So we helped the Gay and Lesbian film festival, a person who made little insects out of glass and the government election registration committee. One of them asked if we were a cult and we said we were followers of Jesus and he said, “oh, a cult”. Other than that, they were very respectful and nice to us. It didn’t seem to bother them at all that we were there.
As people began to show up many would glance at our stall and walk away. So we started asking people if they wanted free water as they passed by. Many responded negatively just by their looks but as the day got hotter… and it did get hot… the water became very popular. In fact, this was the hottest day I have experienced in New Zealand so far. Praise God it happened today!
10 AM – 4 PM: By 11 o’clock Aaron and I had already made 2 trips to the grocery store for more cups and water. We were really distributing a lot of water at the fair. Each cup we gave out had “Whoever drinks the water I give with never thirst again –Jesus” handwritten on it. This made for a lot of work of writing on each cup and filling to keep up with demand. We also had a couple guys with a tray walking around serving people, including other stalls.
Soon people began to ask why we were doing this and we were able to explain our hearts to them. I had a guy walk up to me with a t-shirt that was from the NZ Humanist society. Their slogan was “Reason not Superstition”. He began telling me that he believed Christianity and the bible was a myth. That kicked off a 1.5 hour conversation about the historical credibility of the gospels, morality, other religions, suffering and free will and Jesus’ opinion of Gay and Lesbians. In the end I challenged him to investigate the claims the bible makes and the claims I was making about the bible and I also challenged him to ask Jesus to reveal Himself to him before he went to sleep tonight. He didn’t respond extremely well to those challenges but the conversation overall was very, very good! His name is Kent if you want to say a prayer for him.
During the time I was talking to Kent we had the mayor of Wellington come by our stall and also members of parliament. One of the parliament members said, “Wow, its great to see the church doing this!” People began to call our water ‘Jesus water’ and they began to call Diego ‘Jesus boy’. A couple guys from our team were interviewed by the local media and people were taking tons of pictures of our booth. What a greater image of the body of Christ than the images we see in the media with picket signs full of hate messages!
Other members of our team had spiritual conversations with people including a few Buddhists that had a stall there. Luke walked up the their stall and a Buddhist women began to tell him all about Buddhism. Luke listened very intently and asked questions and allowed her to speak. He could tell that she was very excited that she had an interested audience. Then, she asked him if he had any beliefs. Luke said he was a Christian and the woman responded, “What?! A Christian who actually listens? Well, then let me listen to your beliefs.” And Luke was able to freely share all about Jesus to her. Amazing when it’s invited!!
Back at our stall, we did have a couple people come and give us some strong words – but it was very rare.
4 PM: The fair closed and we began helping the organizers clean up. Our team was the only stall walking around with plastic gloves and garbage bags. We collected the garbage from the other stalls and helped some people take their stuff down. AND our cups, with the verse on them, were all over the fair grounds! It was so cool!
In the end we gave away over a thousand cups of water! Praise the Lord!
(I am praying for you showcase team!)
posted by Peterzog at 9:51 PM
5 Comments:
You 2 are not the only ones getting warm weather, why it is 50+ degrees here so Ha!. I am glad that you are experiencing that love and compassion for those who oppose the Lover of their souls to bring them from the darkness of homosexuality. They know how it ravages their lives, they need to see how their Creator seeks to save them. Great job! I am also excited that the Word is 'pumping blood' in your life as it is alive. While you read current authors and speakers with valuable info I am praying it is the writers of old who have stood the test of time to provide the meat of your meditation. Our prayers are continuing with you!
Love,
What a great ministry opportunity! It sounds like you guys were really able to capitalize on it. Praise God.
Keep it up! That's the kind of salt the earth needs; not Dan's honey roasted peanuts!! (see his blog) Praise God for the simple gift of a cup of water!
J
We missed you at Showcase! What a blessing it was though. You would have been very proud of the team. I am going to share this entry at Edge tonight.
I love being able to read so often what you guys are doing to witness. It convicts me. Its not like you HAVE to go to New Zealand to do that stuff...
Chris
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