Dear praying friends,

I’ve got GREAT news, God is still in the business of saving the Lost, and I’m so so glad!!!

I love love love LOVE Evening Beach Evangelism!

Please warm yourself up with this update on the outstanding things God did!

Lots and lots of people from around the world and all different ages gathered around and listened to the gospel message, many staying around afterwards for one-on-one discussions! We gave out thousands of gospel tracts! Very exciting!!!

Also, Beach Evangelism is a great place to train and build up the Church! We had Christians from a number of different local churches come out this summer to participate and hone their evangelism skills! (And find out that it’s not so terrifying after all.)

And this really is a TEAM ministry. I want to express my gratitude to my ministry partner and friend, Chris McKinley, who lead the ministry while I was away a number of times due to ministry commitments in other places and family commitments. I thank God for Chris!!!

I’ll let the photos tell much of the story…

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In addition to the people in the photos, some other people who stood out are:

• Bud: Bud is an older man in his 60’s. I spoke with him for 20 minutes or so. He told me he’s “on the fence about God.” Bud really struggles with what has often been called, “The Problem of Evil.” Bud has serviced in the Armed Forces. He told me that he’s seen “bad things.” Additionally, his Mom died of Cancer at only 46 years old. And the 6-year-old daughter of a friend was raped and murdered. Unthinkable and horrible! Still, Bud was “almost sure” that God is real. He said he’s thinking about it. Bud took a gospel booklet.

• Sarah and Jenny: Sarah and Jenny are Teenage young ladies who I got into a discussion over a t-shirt Jenny was wearing. She was wearing a shirt from a nerdy Sci-Fi TV show that we both like. So after talking about the show for a bit, I changed the subject to “eternal things” and asked her opinion. Jenny has been considering Buddhism lately. She freely admitted that she’s not sure what to believe. I took her through a complete gospel message by way of “The Good Person Test.” I exhorted her to get to know who Jesus is. I asked her if she’d read “The Gospel of John” if I gave a copy and she gladly agreed! I gave her one and she was very thankful! Praise God!

• Vinnie and Manuela: Vinnie and Manuela are an adorable Hispanic couple in their mid-20’s. They were even wearing matching shirts (so cute!). They want to get married. Manuela believes in God, but Vinnie doesn’t. But he’s open and he’s okay raising their future children going to Catholic Church. I pointed them to Jesus. It’s about Jesus, not a Church. I encouraged them to study the Scriptures. They were very open and even continued to talk after the fireworks started.

• Will: Will is a 16-year-old young man from Russia. He didn’t know anything about God. After a long productive conversation, I asked him, “Have you read the Scriptures?” He said, and I kid you not, “Where do I get these ‘Scriptures?'” It doesn’t get much easier than that! I gave him a Gospel of John. He thanked the team for being there and said it was cool.

• Craig: Craig is an older man in his 60’s. He was drunk and very willing to talk. Craig said you can’t know anything for sure and then told me all the things he knows for sure. He said that Jesus was a man, had a wife, and was a sinner. He said we’re all sinners, and we’re all our own Savior. I asked him, “How can we save ourselves if we’re a sinner? We need someone sinless. We need Jesus.” Sadly, just as we were getting somewhere, his wife made him leave.

• Brent: Brent is a very intelligent 19-year-old. He listened to one of my Open Air messages and then spoke to me about it. He told me he thinks about eternal things all the time, as he’s a fan of Jordan Peterson. (Peterson is a popular conservative speaker, but not a Christian.) Brent thinks we’re all Christ and we all have to suffer and get through it like Christ. I pointed him to the Jesus of the Bible. Brent took an Evangelistic DVD AD and my card. He said, “Dude, you’re awesome.”

• Dwayne: Dwayne is a Military vet. He admitted to murdering people. I asked him where he will spend eternity and he said, “enlighten me.” When I brought him through the gospel message and told him we must be Born Again, Dwayne said he thought everyone is Born Again. I warned him that he’s not getting his info from the Scriptures, and encouraged him to think about what we talked about and the info he was given. (I also thanked him for his military service, of course.)

• Ashley and Buddy: Ashley and Buddy are both brand new Christians. They were soooooo excited to see our team out sharing Jesus on the boardwalk! It was encouraging to hear of their new faith and see how happy they were that Jesus was being proclaimed!

• Bob and LJ: Bob and LJ chatted with Proctor, one of our Volunteers. Bob and LJ have many New Age beliefs, and Proctor did a great job asking good questions to draw out the inconsistencies and lead them into a gospel conversation.

We love you and thank Jesus for you!

Thank you so much for your prayers, financial support, and notes of encouragement, without which we would not be able to reach the Lost for Jesus Christ!

Please contact us anytime and let us know how we can pray for you!

And please feel free to forward this to anyone you think would be blessed by it!

For Christ and His gospel,

Mark, Shelby, Vivienne, Juliana, Caleb, and Gabriella

P.S. If you want to know what’s going on for beach ministry NEXT summer, please let me know and I’ll email you when I begin planning that out next year. Summer 2020 will be here faster than you think! You can also keep an eye out for https://beach.Luke-15.org, as I’ll post news there.