inconvenient, unexpected, Christ honoring gospel ministry

This morning I was sitting at a Starbucks at 6am going over tomorrow's sermon when I over head a customer asking a barrister about the kind of sugar Starbuck's uses. Before I knew it, I had done a Nathan and participated in their conversation. Five minutes later, William was sitting next to me and I was irritated--here are the thoughts I was thinking: "I just want to practice my sermon, why did I go and butt into their conversation?", "I have so much to do today and I want to have quality time with my children which is why I came to Starbucks so early and now I've got to talk to this guy". But over the sound of my incredibly selfish flesh came the voice of the Holy Spirit saying, " I sent William here, I arranged this 6am gospel encounter, share the gospel with him." So I did.

William is a male in his early 30s and a brand new believer, but I'm still not certain how he came to faith in Christ. Prior to Christ, William was a Muslim. Raised in a Muslim home in Argentina, he speaks English and Farsi.

I got to disciple William for about 30-45 minutes. He is really confused about Christianity and rightly so. He's been told some really weird things about Christianity by some Christians. For example, William is trying to pursue a free-lance, fashion photography career, but some Christian told William that Christians shouldn't be in the fashion photography arena. WHAT? A guy comes to faith and Christ and one of the first things he is told is that it's immoral to be a fashion photographer? This is the problem with 21st century discipleship--it's about unbiblical moral rules (albeit, I believe, genuinely motivated by noble intent) instead of helping Christ-followers understand they have been raised from death to life (Eph. 2:1-8) and fanning the flame of their new life until it is a raging fire that consumes every arena of their life--and yes it involves moral guidance--but only biblical moral guidance is helpful, not the personal convictions of random Christians. Generally, discipleship that leads to Christians withdrawing from interaction with lost people instead of engaging with lost people is not biblical discipleship.

William is supposed to come to NEHBC tomorrow. I pray he does. I hope that in us he finds a living community of God that will embrace him and disciple him. I pray that at NEHBC he will find an environment where he is loved for who he is and where he will be taught that the Word of God is entirely true and trustworthy and the final authority on all matters of life, and what it means that Jesus is Lord. I pray he will begin to learn everything the Scriptures teach us because Christ is revealed to us through the Scriptures--from Genesis to Revelation--and so every bit of Genesis to Revelation matters. (If you think I'm soft peddaling the Scriptures, you haven't been to NEHBC where nobody in the community takes a stronger stand on Scripture than we do. We just try to go as far as the Scriptures go on Scripture--we don't stop short of how far we should go on issues and we don't go further than we should go on issues.) And I pray that in the process he will begin to discover he is a Christ commissioned, Christ sent missionary through whom the Lord Jesus wants to make as many disciples as possible.

I'm grateful to God for the opportunity to begin a relationship with William. I'm ashamed of my continued selfishness which is such a struggle for me to shake. I'm thankful the Lord keeps deciding to use me for His glory despite my weaknesses. I pray that one day I'll get over myself entirely!

Glory to God.