FRONT PAGE - here you will find the last 20 postings about recent conversations. Please pray for these people!

Stuck



9/2/16                            Jeremy                             36
It’s been a few days now, and I haven’t heard from Jeremy, 36, whom I ran into on the street for a second Gospel outreach conversation.  The first time we met was at a park several years ago.  He remembered our conversation well, and I had encouraged him to take active steps in the Christian faith he said he had.  “I still have the Bible and other stuff you gave me, they are on the shelf right under my TV” he said.  Indeed they are, and there they sit, unread, gathering dust.  He never called the number I gave him either, as I had offered to meet with him and help him along in his faith.  So now we had the same sort of conversation in which he sees himself as a follower of Jesus, but he doesn’t attend church or read the Bible, and is stuck in a holding pattern with some sinful habits and lifestyle choices. 

The one thing that leads Jeremy to believe he is following Jesus is that he says he prays every day, with both prayers of gratitude and requests for safety and blessing.  “But how does God speak into your life?” I asked him.  “You say you talk to God, but do you listen?”  Jeremy had been blessed with a faithful Christian mother, whom he said had talked to him about the same thing I was  just two days earlier.  No doubt her influence has helped him have a general idea of to Whom he is praying to, but he can only coast on from her influence for so long.  He needs to take ownership of his faith, to read the Bible for himself, to seek out biblical preaching and teaching and church fellowship.  He needs a constant source of biblical truth and mid-course correction as he goes.  Otherwise he is gradually replacing the God he was raised to believe in with a god of his own making, a god who allows him to neglect his need for truth and correction and discipline, a god that wants his Bible to gather dust in order to keep him stuck in sin. 

“If you keep doing the same thing, you’ll end up with the same results” I told Jeremy.  He enthusiastically agreed (again) so I invited him to meet with me again and this time I got his number rather than wait for him to call me.  He can only receive text messages, so I am waiting for his reply so we can meet and I can help speak some biblical truth into his life.   Will you pray for him to follow through?  I will report back here with a comment when he does…

No comments: