On the first week of January 2016, I had lunch with a young lady who was one of our consultants.
I had been praying in the morning on the Core Value of our church being a witnessing church.
I asked God for grace to share Jesus with her. During lunch, I asked her whether she had heard the 4 Spiritual Laws and she said no.
I then boldly took out the 4 Spiritual Laws and read the first page to the page where there was the sinner's prayer. I asked her if she would like to pray the prayer. To my surprise she did!
It was just a simple act of faith - no emo, no fanfare nothing. I just shared the heart of the Gospel with her that Jesus is the only mediator between God and man and that man through his efforts can never reach God.
I was so touched by the work of salvation grace brought about by the Spirit of the Lord. Truly salvation is not of our works but it is a gift of God.
God showed me this very important point about lessons from the fishermen. The fishermen fish in faith. He just sits at the riverbank and lets down his bait. He has not seen the fish yet but he patiently waits for the tug at the end of the rod.
It is also a work of patience and perseverance. He may have to wait for a certain length of time but he will continue to wait until he catches his fish.
In the same way, I must have tested the patience of my seniors in the University when they tried to reach out to me. Time and time again in that span of my 4 year course in the University several seniors approached me to share the Gospel with me. There was a buddy system where the older Christians would befriend the first yearers to take us under their wings.
Apart from showing us around the varsity and being our friend, they also showered upon us genuine Christian love and friendship. I must have had the Gospel shared with me more than 50 times. I must have attended several churches during that period.
Finally I came to the Lord when the Spirit of the Lord revealed Jesus to me. I received the revelation in my heart during one worship meeting and heard the voice of the Lord. I heard the Spirit saying to me "Everything in the Bible is true. I died for your sins on the Cross and I resurrected from the dead."
Then I heard John 3:16 quoted to me and the love of God overflowed me from head to toe! It was like warm honey.....
I also recall how my father gave his heart to Jesus. So many times I shared with him the Gospel, so many times I prayed for him. At one time he had a heart attack and the Lord just delivered him from death when we laid hands and prayed for him.
My father prayed the sinner's prayer at one evangelistic meeting but did not go to church for fear of my mother. The Lord also touched his knee pain and healed him.
Today my mother's heart have softened a great deal. I think I must have shared with my mum over 20 times the Gospel message over and over again. Many people also had visited her to share with her and prayed for her salvation.
One day my mother told me that she attended Sunday school! That means she would have heard the Gospel from young!
Scriptures abound on the longsuffering of God in reaching out to the lost:
2 Peter 3:9 "The Lord is not slack concerning His promise as some count slackness but is longsuffering toward us, not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance and consider that the longsuffering of the Lord is salvation"
Romans 2:4 "Or do you despise the riches of His goodness, forbearance and longsuffering not knowing that the goodness of God leads you to repentance"
I think longsuffering is deeper and stronger than patience as to suffer long is to endure those who mock us, reject us and say all kinds of nasty things about us. It is to keep on loving, praying and reaching out to the very ones who turned their face against us time and time again until they give their hearts to Jesus.
I was very touched during Christmas day when a brother of one of sisters came forward to receive Christ after the salvation message was preached.
I know that this sister had written her brother's name year after year to put on the prayer wall and then in the prayer bowl.
Patience and longsuffering - God we need more of this!
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