Country Music Leads to the Gospel – Southampton Evangelism
After being away on leave for a couple of weeks, it was great to return to Southampton for an outreach. I was concerned about today’s outreach since most of those I work with were away with other commitments, however, the Lord answered prayer. A man from my church, who works in the city, was able to join me for just over an hour; evangelism is always easier when there are at least two people.
We set up the open-air board and the Free Bible table, then began handing out tracts. Within minutes of starting, three young Irish ladies approached me – they didn’t stop because they wanted to hear about Jesus, but because they had confused me with the American country music singer - Luke Combs (apparently, I look like him). They were a little disappointed when I told them I wasn’t him and that I don’t have a fast car (a reference to one of his songs). Since I am a country music fan, I connected with them on that basis and then swung the conversation around to the gospel.
These Irish ladies told me they were all good Irish Catholics who attended mass weekly and prayed the rosary. They hoped by these religious actions, they would get to Heaven, but if not, it would lessen their time in Purgatory. We had a wonderful chat about the finished work of Jesus and how He alone can save sinners. At the end of our conversation, they all took tracts and copies of John’s Gospel.
Shortly after chatting to the Irish ladies, I noticed a man browsing the literature on the open-air board. As we chatted, he told me he had a big question - “How can a person be forgiven?” It isn’t every day that you get a question like that! The man told me his name was Ronnie, and he hoped he had been good enough to be saved. Together, we spent time looking at God’s definition of sin and how all of us aren’t good when compared to God. I shared how our goodness won’t save us, but Jesus can. By the end of our chat, Ronnie asked that we pray for him and said he wanted to trust in Jesus.
It was nearing 2 p.m., so I thought it best to start preaching. I took John 3:16 as my text and explained that I had a message of good news and love. Within a couple of minutes, two hecklers began to yell at me. One walked by shouting - “If God is love, why did He send COVID, and why did my parents die?” He wasn’t interested in an answer, but he did stir people's attention. Another man came rushing out of a bank saying, “God is just a result of mathematics and isn’t real.” I asked him, “How do you know that is true?” When he heard the question a look of concern crossed his face, and he quickly shouted, “It just is true. How do you know is real?” Then he ran back to the bank.
People were now looking on, so I did a brief apologetic on the existence of God, then went back to preaching the gospel from John 3:16. At the end of the message, when I initially offered copies of John’s Gospel to those who would like to find out more, no one responded, but then a few minutes later two people came up to me. They told me they had been discussing all that I had preached and what the hecklers had said. After talking about it together, they decided the hecklers were wrong, so they wanted to discover more about Jesus. Both took copies of John’s Gospel. The Lord had used the hecklers to allow His truth to spread!
After the open-air, we went back to handing out tracts and chatting to people. During this time, Huw handed out numerous tracts and engaged some people who were sitting nearby discussing Christian issues. It was a great blessing to have Huw with me today. After he returned to work, I preached once more, then packed up for the day.
My final open-air message was on “The Way to Heaven.” A few people paused to listen; at the end of the message, two people responded by asking for copies of John’s Gospel.
It was great to be back on the streets. Please pray for all those who heard the good news.
SDG!