Almost done!???

Wow! Where has the time gone? I only have 4 more days at the Olympics! I am ready for a break but the work there is nowhere near finished. Many seeds have been planted, but not all of them. There are still people who have not heard about the Gospel. Each day it gets harder and harder to preach the gospel because we have to keep up with the people that we meet everyday as well as the people we already know.  It is impossible to preach to 50+ people at a time and we do not really have a choice who we are with for the day. It's all up to God.

I would consider today as one of the best days so far. I was able to chat with a Muslim man named Abdul from Sudan (I called him Abe). We talked about the many differences between Islam and Christianity. The funny thing was, we started this subject after about 5 sentences of talking with each other; totally the work of God. His english was not perfect so it took us the majority of the morning to discuss these differences. After, I was able to explain to him why I believe in Christianity and how I came to believe in God. He agreed with many of the things that I had said but disagreed with a few important parts. In the end we agreed to disagree. The most significant thing I told him was about when I was searching for God. Back then, I would pray not addressing the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, but I would address him as my Creator. At that point in my life, I believed in intelligent design but I was not sure if my Creator was the one mentioned in the Bible. So I challenged Abe to do what I did, I prayed that my Creator would reveal himself to me, that he would make it plain to me his identity. I hope that he will follow through on this and that God would make himself known to Abe. Please pray for him.

Jade and I had a sweet conversation with Nixon, the crosswalk attendant at Whistler Olympic Park. This guy was always smiling and was in a good mood no matter how bad the weather, how many hours he worked or how stupid the drivers/pedestrians were. Eventually, by the hand of God, after Jade and I said hi, again we ended up on the subject of God. He explained to us that he was a christian (as I suspected) but not a very strong christian. We talked the basics of theology and he had very similar beliefs to us but he had a post-modern flavour of inclusivism. He believed that Islam, Hinduism or Buddism and were all legitimate ways of knowing God. We discussed the Lord's Prayer and I was able to break it down and explain to him what it meant to me. In case you don't know, I have become very fond of the Lord' prayer so I was delighted to share it with him. He requested us to pray for him, that God would enlighten him, to open his mind as see who God really is. I confronted his lack of Bible study and said that one of the best ways to learn about God is in his word and he seemed to take it seriously. Could you also join me in prayer for Nixon?

Lots of cool things happening not only in the lives of others but in my own as well. I am realizing the need to be in the word (an answer to a prayer) and I have burst out of my comfort zone quite a few times. Today I was able to remember many things about my conversations with Abe and Nixon, an answer to another prayer. My self esteem has never stopped growing towards a healthier level and I am not ashamed at all to tell people that I am a Christian, to pray out loud among non-christians or read my Bible in public. I have never cared more about the lives of others while not caring one bit about what they think about me! Yeah, so glad that I have this experience. Please pray for a strong finish to this race and to finish the 2 weeks worth of procrastinated homework.

Thanks for your prayers,

Trent McKone