Hello Everyone!
I picked up Soriya at the Hare Krishna commune last Sunday around 1:00. She introduced me to one of her friends and said, “This is Anu. Her name used to be Anastasia.” I inquired, “Anu, you look young. How old are you?” She answered, “Twenty.” She said she had been living in the Hare Krishna village since she was seventeen, and her parents lived in Santa Monica. I silently speculated the sequence of events in this young girl’s life that could have led her to joining the Hare Krishna cult. I said, “Anu, come with Soriya and me today. We are going to have a lot of fun and go to church tonight!” She said, “No, I can’t go. I have to chant.” Soriya and I left and spent the day together. I had big plans for us to take a bike ride and talk about the Bible and The Case for Christ, which she said she had been reading. We got down to the bike rental shop, and she informed me that she couldn’t ride a bike. So, I had the slowest bike ride of my life behind her, in her long sari, and her tricycle for about 2 miles along the beach! She thanked me for renting her the tricycle, informing me that she only gets an allowance of $17 a week in her Hare Krishna life. As promised, she went with me to Grace Community Church last Sunday night. Unfortunately, she was not the least bit open after hearing John MacArthur speak on 1 John and sin. On the way back home, I told her the Gospel, and I asked her how she knew her “holy book” could be trusted as God’s Word. She said, “Because I know the way it makes me feel.” I asked if there was any historical evidence or archaeological evidence to authenticate it as the truth. She just changed the subject. I said, “Soriya, I invited you to church tonight, because I love you, and if you were to die tonight, you would be eternally separated from God. There is no such thing as reincarnation. The Bible teaches that Jesus is the only way to God.” We continued to talk, and I told her that she had been deceived in her chanting for happiness and peace. She got very, very mad. We drove for miles in silence. I realized that the Holy Spirit was not apparently working, so after about five minutes of a silent truce, I changed the subject. She told me that she was a teacher and a leader in the Hare Krishna religion. I thought to myself, if she had planned on converting me, she now knows she was mistaken. We said we would keep in touch, but I don’t anticipate spending anymore time with her, unless I can see the Holy Spirit at work in her life. She said she was extremely surprised that I could be “ignorant” enough to tell her there is only one way to God. I said, “I didn’t say that. Jesus did. I am only telling you what the Bible says.” By the end of the day trip, at least she did admit that we did not believe the same thing after all and that Christianity and Hare Krishna are mutually exclusive.
John and Inella came to the booth from the Simi Valley last week. They came all the way to Ocean Front Walk to talk to us and get advise. I gave John’s number to one of the elders at my church for follow up. He had come to the table last summer, and returned out of the blue last week. John was still very down and said he had thoughts of suicide. Inella was a Mormon. She took “Mormonism vs. Christianity,” as well as a Bible. I gave John some information on depression from Family Life Communications. We all prayed together before they left.
A man named Edward approached my table a few days ago. He was scared that someone had put a curse on him. He has been dating the psychic, Angellea, who is planning on going with me to the Creation Science Museum soon in San Diego. I told Edward that his only hope was Jesus Christ. He said that Angellea prays secret prayers at night that no one can hear. He said she bows down to pictures of herself on a shrine with candles and prays to “god.” Edward said he was doing some research on Edgar Cayce. I gave him a tape by Walter Martin on Edgar Cayce, and he said he would listen and get back to me. I gave his number to a man from my church for discipleship.
Curtis is now coming to my church regularly. I met him at the beach about six months ago. He prays the sweetest, most humble prayers at our Bible study. Jeremy is now working at the LTW booth on Saturdays. I met him at the booth about nine months ago. He stopped drinking totally and has his own place to live now. He is attending church every Sunday, and he serves faithfully in handing out bagels every Saturday morning to the neighborhood. We met Kurt last Saturday at the booth. He was extremely low. He took a book donated by Family Life Communications called Absolute Surrender. He said he had been living in obedience to the Bible, but he didn’t have any joy…He came back to the table with a big smile on his face and said, “I read the first chapter of the book. Can you tell that I am feeling better?” He was in church last Sunday and says he plans on coming back regularly.
Last Saturday three students from the Master’s College joined me. The blessing was all mine. They broke off into groups and covered the entire scope of the walkway. While they were gone sharing the Gospel, a woman passed by, read my sign “Come find out what God has to say about your future for free,” and shouted, “God? What God? Where’s God?” She saw my other sign, “A free gift for you,” and replied mockingly, “It is not a gift if nobody wants it.”
For the word of the cross is to those who are perishing foolishness, but to us who are being saved, it is the power of God.(1Cor. 1:18).
But a natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God; for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually appraised. (1 Cor. 2:14)
But just as it is written, “Things which eye has not seen and ear has not heard, and which have not entered the heart of man, all that God has prepared for those who love Him.” (1 Cor. 2:9)
Because He fist loved me,
Dwayna
