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| Sharing Jesus With the Incoherent - Real Life Stories |
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When I first got saved, I was ready to tell the whole world about Jesus! You know how obnoxious new believers can be :) I talked to every family member, co-worker, person I saw on the street and basically anyone who had an ear!
When they wouldn't listen, I felt the tug of God to go into a local nursing home and share the love of Jesus there. I was overwhelmed by this thought, having not even read the entire Bible myself. I thought, "How can I tell them about a book I haven't read?" But the Lord said go, so I went. The first thing I did was to look in a local phone book and try and find a place. I made several calls and only one got back to me. She asked me if I would come in to meet her. She sat me down and asked me a series of questions. I simply gave my answers, and she jumped up and said, "Praise the Lord!!!" "I cannot talk to the residents about Jesus, since I am an employee, so I prayed that the Lord would send someone else." "I then ask the Lord to make it clear and I gave him a list, and you answered every single question the exact way that I had discussed with the Lord. You are the one!"
She immediately sat down and made up a list of all of the residents that she wanted to share the gospel with. But on the top of the list was a woman who was already a Christian. She said "Go and talk to Bertha first each time you come, she will pray for you and fire you up, and you will be armed and ready to go." So my first stop was "Bertha's" room aka "Betty." This was 16 years ago and I can barely type this just remembering the powerful effect Betty had on my life. She was 92 and the most fired up Pentecostal women I ever met in my life! Her words of wisdom to me were always to read the Word of God and to absorb it in. She said that she couldn't see, she could barely hear and she was so blessed to have the Word tucked away in her heart. She would always say, "don't let the days pass you by, while you still have your sight and hearing."
So, I would go into Betty's room each time I visited, and get a good dose-of-the-ghost :), then I would be on my way to tell anybody about Jesus who was willing to listen. This place was very old, dirty, smelled to the hills and the people were quite neglected. So most of the residents welcomed visitors with open arms, even if they were Jesus freaks!
I started to develop relationships with many of these fine folks. I began to see God saving souls one by one. It was truly amazing to be used by God in this capacity. One woman said to me, "I don't think you realize that I was going to hell before you came and visited me, now I am going to heaven, because you told me about Jesus." To God be the glory, He does the saving, and we are merely his vessels.
There was another fellow who was incoherent. He just sat in a chair and stared. It was very sad. I would come in and say, "Hello sir, would you mind if I share the Bible with you?" Since I didn't get an answer, I took that as a yes :) So I read scripture to him, prayed over him, and played a song or two on the guitar. This went on for a while. One day I went in to his room and saw the dreaded empty bed. It was always very hard for me, since I am extremely emotional. I walked out of his room and a nurse was calling my name down the hall. I will never forget these words. She said, "Mr. ___ daughter told me to make sure that I told you that she had been praying for her father for 30 years and he said he gave his heart to the Lord because some girl was coming in his room with a guitar week after week telling him about Jesus." I didn't even think this man could hear! I never got one ounce of response from him! And my guitar playing was the pits back then!
Somewhere along the visits, my brother joined me and we began to have a monthly church service. We called ourselves "Good News." So it would just say on their calendars, "Good News in the dining room." :) We basically bought our guitars just so we could have worship at our service. I started taking guitar lessons from Pastor Mark and we learned 5 easy to play songs for worship. As a result of God's goodness, we began to see lives changed.
We would basically go around every month and say "hey, can I wheel you down to church?" "It is non-denominational and all are welcomed." It wasn't like they had anything else on their calendars, so many of them came.
There was one man who would sit in the hallway and refuse to come. He would say, "I have lived a very bad life. I am not good enough to come to church." And I would respond, "Same here Albert, but you are exactly the kind of person God wants to change." We were persistent. Week after we just kept on asking. Finally he said, "well okay." So he came for a few weeks, and one day we were playing Amazing Grace on the guitar, and this guy had both of his hands lifted straight up to heaven with tears rolling down his face! So I went over to him after service and said, "you've met Jesus, haven't you?" And he responded "Yes, ma'am, thank you." Could you trade this feeling for anything?
Even when we think they can't hear, or that they aren't listening, God's Word will never return void.
Go and share the good news!
Now let's hear a story about how God has used you to lead someone to Christ.
4:12 For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and spirit, of joints and marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart. |
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| Great story, Sue. It is wonderful when God lets us see how he used us. It doesn't always happen, but when it does, we stand in awe. |
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Kathy |
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September 24, 2007 at 5:40am |
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| Sue, this is excellent, imho your best blog ever! Thank you for sharing such a personal and important story and for caring about such a wonderful group of people! The nursing homes house one of the many groups of God's precious children that we marginalize and neglect. |
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| I'm with Kathy Sue, this was so worth taking a few minutes out of my workday for! Truly, this is an uplifting amazing blog. Thanks for sharing this!!! ~mike |
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| Awesome story sue. Thanks for brightening my day. |
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Danced To Jesus
We actually started doing Bible Study before we had a ministry. Each Sunday afternoon, after service, my family (each of us attended to our own separate churches) would gather together at my mom's house, for bible study. We did this for a whole year. Many times, in the closing prayer, my brother Gray would asked that we pray for his wife Mary. "I tried and tried to get Mary to come, but she just keep giving one excuse after the other." Gary would say. I encourage him to just keep believing God. A year later we started Kenami Ministries. At one of the services, we were to be ministered to by our adult dance ministry and my brother Gary was one of the dancers. I remember that day like it was yesterday. Before the service began, I looked around and saw Mary, Gary's wife coming through the door. "Well, I don't believe my eyes," I said to her. She told me that she wanted to see her husband dance. It was a wonderful service that day, the dancers danced, the preachers preached the Word and the invitation was made. Needless to say, that day Mary gave her life to Christ. Praise God. Three days later, I received a phone call from my mom. Mary had passed away in her sleep. All I could do was shout Glory, all Praises to Our Father. Mary was danced into heaven. Pastor Aminata |
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Kay |
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September 24, 2007 at 8:37am |
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| As an Activity Director for over 25 years in Nursing Homes and Assisted Living communities I can appreciate your volunteer time. I worked in secular communities therefore as an employee I could not share the Gospel, but I did it anyway. Now I work in a Christian Assisted Living where I can pray, preach, do whatever for the Lord. I Love It. God rewarded me for all the heartache I went through for standing up for HIM. Praise the Lord. |
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Deb |
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September 24, 2007 at 12:14pm |
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| I used to be an Activity Director in a nursing home...at the time I worked there, it was all private pay, so we COULD preach the gospel. We had various churches volunteer their time to come in to hold a service, and we had a nurse that did bible study, I shared a daily devotion with them at the morning activity...having someone like you come into a nursing home and spend time with the residents, would have been a blessing to all. So many of those people are "forgotten" by their families and friends, and to have someone come in and take the time to share what you did is wonderful. God Bless you Sue! |
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| Wonderful Sue. This truely blessed me |
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Praise the Lord, Sue! This encourages us all to go and spread the News. I also play the guitar, but I love the people, so I don't sing hehe! |
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JayKTX |
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September 24, 2007 at 6:44pm |
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Outstanding and life changing story! It has inspired me. I know I am called to similar ministry but haven't been released to it yet. Here's a different kind of testimony: I prefer to buy my cosmetics in a store but somehow I started buying Avon from someone who delivered it. One day she showed me a brochure about a new perfume called "Charisma" and I started telling her what that word meant in the Bible and she got saved. |
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Denise |
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September 24, 2007 at 7:03pm |
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| Wonderful testimony Sue, I pray for that kind of boldness to witness as you did. That had to be a wonderful experience |
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Kathy |
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September 24, 2007 at 7:22pm |
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| Wow, JayKTX! That was some perfune! |
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JayKTX |
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September 25, 2007 at 6:15am |
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Kathy~ Yes, it opened up dialogue for me to tell her about the ultimate Heavenly Miraculous Gift, available at no cost to her! |
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Glenn |
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September 26, 2007 at 10:18am |
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Sue your story brought tears to my eyes. I have a friend in a nursing home and it depresses me to visit her. I am sure that God has spoken to my heart here, sending me along to visit more regularly. Thank you for the nudge and the wonderful story of God's saving grace.
peace
glenn |
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