For a photo report on our week in this city click on this link:

http://picasaweb.google.com/davidporter55/PontAMoussonOutreach
You can do it hundreds of times and it’s still not easy.

Last week, Phyllis and I were at Pont à Mousson, France for a week of outreach evangelism. About 15 adults gather in this little church on Sundays. It is an outstation of the church in Nancy, around 20 miles away where Claude Huot is pastor.

Each afternoon we spilled out into the streets with Christians from the Nancy church as well as the local annex, to hand out invitations and talk to people about the Lord and their relationship with Him. I’ve done this hundreds of times, especially when we were in Luxembourg, but it’s still tough. We fear rejection or being made to feel ridiculous, don’t we?

And a few people were a bit nasty. Not many, though. Most were non-committal. A few came to the evening services, but many, many others took time to talk about the Lord and their own spiritual beliefs. I estimate that we had from 50-150 good conversations with people on the sidewalks, in public parks, and wherever the opportunity presented itself.

If we could get one hundred unbelievers to come hear the gospel in our church we would be thrilled, wouldn’t we? Maybe the key is going to them instead of waiting for them to come to us.

A few people stood out to me: Those young Muslim fellows who debated us. We were trying to evangelize them and they tried to “evangelize” us. It was heated but respectful. These guys seemed to be fairly well versed in what they believed. Since September 11, the Muslim doctrine seems to be touching more young people, partly, I think, because they feel rejected and blamed by the society around them. Pray.

A white-haired fellow stuck in my memory. When the pastor tried to give him an invitation, he rejected it heatedly, saying he already knew he was going where it’s hot. Another refused to discuss anything, simply saying he had his own beliefs.

Many, many said openly they didn’t believe in God. “It’s hard enough to believe in yourself,” one young man remarked.
And then there was that young lady on the square with her boyfriend. He seemed a bit hostile at first and she seemed wary. But as I shared about Jesus, His love, and what He desires to do in our life, her face changed. At times it seemed there were flashes of longing. How I desire to see them and others like them know the fullness of life that comes by faith in Jesus Christ.

A world without God hasn’t brought the joy that many Europeans thought it would. Pursuing selfish passions leaves emptiness the next day. Schools that studiously exclude God and extol humanism can’t heal the hurt of a man’s soul. Unbridled lust causes men to lose hunger, even for that which is good. Everything lacks luster.

Pray for Pont à Mousson. Pray for France. Pray for Europe. Oh, how God longs to move here. Your prayers are making a difference.

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Pray that the seed sown will find good soil and change hearts. Pray for a lady who lost both her parents recently. Our teams had scores of good talks with young people. They’ve been starved spiritually but I think they’re beginning to feel the emptiness of a humanism that leaves out God. Pray for them. Pray for some young Muslim men that we talked to about the Lord, for a young lady and her boy friend who listened attentively as we shared the gospel, as well as three young men on a park beach who spoke very openly.

Pray for the little church we worked with. They have about 15 on Sunday mornings but there is a young couple who really have a heart to see this town touched and this church grow. It was their idea to have this outreach.

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