Ok! Story time!
About half way through training camp, we were told we were going to go door-to-door evangelizing in a neighborhood nearby. When I heard this, my heart skipped a beat. Honestly, I was very uncomfortable at this idea at first. I didn’t feel ready for this! I later found out that a lot of other people on my squad felt the same, but none of us wanted to say it. “Do our leaders seriously think we were ready? The Lord is teaching us some incredible things right now, but we still need time to process it all. And we are just supposed to jump straight into living out what we have learned?”
Yep.
One thing God made abundantly clear to me during training camp is that EVERYTHING in the Kingdom boils down to being obedient to the Lord. I know that sounds obvious to put it that way, but how many of us really live that out? I definitely didn’t. Evangelism is ALL about obedience to the Lord. Effective evangelism is not always in the response you get from the people you minister to. Sometimes all you do is plant a seed, and there may not be any outward sign at all. Rather, effectively evangelism is found in your obedience to the Lord’s commands.
The same day that we found out we would be evangelizing, our squad leaders and mentor brought us to an elementary school, where we spent time in prayer before stepping out into our mission field: a neighborhood on the other side of the street. We were told specifically to ask the Lord for direction (words, images, whatever). While praying, I thought I saw an image of a house. I wasn’t really sure if I had imagined it or not, so I chose to stay silent. One of my teammates, however, boldly stated, “I see grandma wearing green.” Odd, but ok. We’ll go with that since no one else has any clues they’re willing to share.
We walked for a little bit, but we didn’t walk up to any houses right away. Some of us were hoping that our squad leader Brittany would step up and show us how it’s supposed to be done. But nope! Brittany had a different idea. “Is anyone getting anything from the Lord? A direction? An image? Anything?”
Yikes. Well since we have no idea which house to start with, I guess I’ll speak up. “Now I don’t know if this is really anything at all, but when we were praying, I thought I saw an image of a 1-story house with a white vehicle (of some kind) in the driveway and a tree in the front yard.” My team seemed oddly supportive of that. We finally had an idea of what to look for……. on a street full of 2-story houses. Unlikely, sure. But oh man, God delivered!
The VERY NEXT HOUSE that we saw was a one-story house with a single white car in the driveway and a tree in the front yard. Woah! My eyes about popped out of my head!
Despite that, no one answered the door. At first, I was kind of discouraged, but then I had a thought. “Brittany, have you found that sometimes, when the Lord shows you something, He is testing out your obedience? Like He wants to see if you will step out in faith (into that uncomfortable, uncertain space) and live out what He commands of you?”
“Oh, for sure,” she replied. Bam. It was like I had an epiphany at that moment. Ok God, I see You! Let’s do this. I was finally starting to feel pretty good about this! Even if people don’t respond well, this whole evangelistic outing is also about growing our faith and our obedience to Him. So really, no matter the outcome, we win something from even just being here!
Meanwhile, my teammate who saw “grandma wearing green” felt the Lord leading him to a particular house, but he didn’t say anything at first. He kind of shrugged it off. He finally told us about it as he saw the car pull out of the driveway and drive off. Sure enough, he said, “I missed my shot. That was the grandma wearing green.” First of all, my mind was blown! My first thought was not to be disappointed but rather be excited at what we just witnessed!
“I don’t think this was a missed opportunity,” I said. “You may not have had a chance to talk to her anyway. She was about to head off. Maybe the Lord just wanted to confirm in you what He confirmed in me a minute ago. He was showing you that what you saw in the elementary school parking lot was REAL! You can’t make this stuff up! He really spoke to you!”
We went from door to door for a while, not really getting many great responses, but I felt more and more certain that the Lord was actively speaking to us with every house we stopped at. The final house we stopped at was an experience all in its own!
We knocked on the door, and a young woman answered the door. She seemed a little bit annoyed. “Hi. We are with Adventures in Missions. We are getting ready to embark on an 11-month mission trip, but for now, we are in the neighborhood and we’re wondering if we could just pray with you guys.” She declined. But the man that was walking past her at the moment said, “Hey. I’m going through a divorce. I could really use some prayer for that.”
Bingo.
We invited him outside and spent some time talking with him. As it turns out, he was a believer. So we spent some time just getting to know him and his story. Even more interesting was the fact that the man didn’t even live in the house! He was just visiting his sister that day so she could help him finalized his divorce papers!
HA! God, You are too good! This timing couldn’t be better!
We prayed for him and his family by name, each of us taking turns. We prayed specifically about whatever the Holy Spirit had placed on our hearts to pray for. The man was so touched, even saying, “You guys really have no idea how special this is. You have no idea how much you prayed specifically in my life with those prayers.” We assured him that the Lord loves him, and no matter what happens, He has plans for his life that include joy and peace. We even exchanged contact information with him! What an awesome way to close the day out!
My advice to you? Live an obedient life! If you have something on your heart, line it up with Scripture. If it is not in opposition with God’s word, try asking the Lord what He would like you to do with that idea and LIVE IT OUT (yes! As quirky as it sounds)! I heard a story at training camp about a girl who felt like the Lord wanted her to do a random handstand/cartwheel at a gas station. A man that was standing around there started bawling. Come find out, the man had juts prayed, “God, if you are real, send someone to do a handstand right now.”
What may seem silly to you may have eternal consequences for someone else! Isn’t looking silly for one moment worth another person’s peace and joy? Jesus thought we were worth dying for! His people are for sure worth looking silly for! But rest assured, when the Lord moves through that silly display of obedience, it suddenly doesn’t seem so silly anymore!
In all things, be blessed!
AG
