Post by Messenger Micah on Oct 12, 2005 22:53:03 GMT -5
Joining myself to the outreach at South Beach this week were my wife Elizabeth, Doug, John and Onica, and Emmanuel. We believe there was a special event going on this weekend because it was very crowded and many of the people there were African Americans.
We parked on 12th Street again, set up our banners, and headed to 11th Street and Collins by the Trade Fairwinds restaurant and bar, because we saw a large group of people hanging around that area. We stood with our banners and Doug preached there. We then headed towards Ocean Drive.
Coming on to Ocean Drive by the Clevelander Bar there were many people on the sidewalk in front of the bar. The Clevelander is an open bar, and they had a female dancer on a platform right near the sidewalk. As I walked up on this scene, I lifted up my voice, lifted up my Bible, pointed toward the woman dancing, and preached for a few minutes on Matthew 5:28 and I Corinthians 6:9-10. I think everyone was shocked and the dancer looked at me, became noticeably uncomfortable, and stopped dancing. We then stood across the street with our banners and had some good witnessing conversations.
We then walked to the Coral Wall at 10th Street. There was a small group of about 10 to 15 people hanging around so I got up on the wall and preached for about 20 minutes. I had a black, homosexual fitness type who was a decent heckler for a while. I have seen this guy many times, offered him gospel tracts, but do not remember ever having a conversation with him.
We moved down the wall to where Wet Willie?s is. There were about 25 to 35 people hanging around here. Doug, Onica, Emmanuel, and John all preached here. They preached until the crowd began to dwindle. We then moved down to across the street from Wet Willie?s.
While we were standing across from Wet Willie?s and witnessing, I asked someone to hold my banner and I walked down Ocean Drive to use the restroom. As I walked, I would lift up my voice, and do as Jesus did, calling ??sinners to repentance? (Matthew 9:13). I saw a large group of about 25 hanging around outside of Paradise Bistro, so I stood across the street and was going to preach for a few minutes. As I started preaching, someone started to yell at me from across the street, ?Pro-choice! Pro choice!? As I responded to him, this really got the crowd?s attention, and involvement so I continued preaching for about 15 minutes. I felt it was very effective.
We then began heading toward the Clevelander again. As we moved away from Wet Willie?s I preached to a group across the street all hanging around outside for a few minutes. Everywhere we went we seemed to have the attention of the people, so we preached everywhere.
We stood across from Mango?s with our banners and it was very loud, so I did not try to preach over the music, but stood holding my Bible up, pointing up and down, etc., speaking only loud enough for those in the immediate vicinity to hear. Everyone out in front were watching us, and looking at the banners. A group of young African American guys came up on the side of us and were listening. One had on a shirt that said something negative about President Bush (I don?t remember exactly what it said). As they walked by I noticed one had on a Bob Marley shirt on and I told them Bob Marley was in hell. Some started laughing and yelled back at me that so was Elvis. I ran over to them, pointed at them, and told them, ?Yes he is but you guys don?t look like the Elvis fans or the headbanger type, but the Bob Marley, hip-hop type!? They laughed and kept walking.
A group of guys and girls, who appeared to be Middle Eastern saw me do this and made a comment to me. These guys dressed like thugs, used profanity, and were drinking. I told them they needed to repent of sin, put faith in Jesus and live a holy life, because without holiness they would end up in hell. One guy got all worked up and got up in my face, bumped me, pointing at me, etc. They told me they worshipped some god that began with an r (rabala or something), and one guy showed me a medallion of his god. I told him that was idolatry, he was breaking the 1st and 2nd commandment, and he and his god would end up in hell unless they repented because Jesus is the only way and quoted them John 14:6 and Acts 4:12. Now another guy was all up in my face, pointing at me, with beer breath, etc. By now Emmanuel had come to my ?rescue?, but he was not much help in cooling down the situation, because we all know he almost started a riot a few weeks ago with the lesbian strippers. They acted like they wanted at us, but held each other back, held themselves back, and walked away from us.
We then moved down to the Clevelander, and stood there awhile with our banners. A blonde lady got all upset and started yelling at John. This drew a lot of attention, so we were able to preach and witness to more people. I think this lady was a professing Christian, but I don?t remember all the details.
We started preaching on top of the Lummus Park sign. Onica, Elizabeth, Doug, John, Emmanuel all preached here. We were here for about 2 hours.
Once again the young unmarried ?couple? who are professing Christians came there to pray against us. John works with a girl who knows this girl and her boyfriend. It turns out they have been ?discipling? (?) the guy who came out of the Goldfinger strip bar last week and slapped my bullhorn. (I don?t think their discipleship program is working very well). The guy told this girl about our encounter with him, and she told him she ??saw those same guys on the beach. Those guys are everywhere!?
John tried to reason with this ?couple? and the girl told him she was a ?Prophetess?. She also rebuked John, and called him satan.
During our preaching here, our local photographer friend Dean showed up again to take some more pictures of us. He goes to a lot of local events and takes pictures, such as anti-war protests, etc. He has a web site where he puts all his photos, and he gave us a section called ?Repent or Perish? at www.pbase.com/lautermilch.
We all had good conversations as people stopped to listen to the preaching and ask questions. Three young African American guys who claimed to be into Rastafarianism, talked to me for a while, listened, asked questions, and filmed my answers. At first they were kind of silly, but at the end were very respectful, and attentive. I also had a l-o-n-g conversation with a Jewish guy who claimed his income was 7 figures and that he was the Lord.
During the preaching here, there were fireworks going off on the beach. The ?couple? seemed to feel this was an answer to their prayers to shut us down, but we continued preaching right through the fireworks.
As we went back to Doug?s van, the street was all blocked off and there were police everywhere. They were arresting two young African American guys right next to Doug?s van. We were able to put our ?gospel wagon? with all our supplies up and headed out on foot to do some street corner preaching.
I decided to preach at the corner of 11th Street and Collins. There were a good number of listeners at the other three corners where I was preaching (about 40 in total) as well as many others passing by. The acoustics here were great and I am sure I was heard way down the block also. After about 50 minutes as I was getting ready to stop, three police officers on bicycles rode up. They were very polite, almost apologetic, telling me they realized my rights to do what I was doing, but they were getting complaints, so I would have to keep the noise down. I told them I was sorry, I understood, and I was finished anyway. I asked them for their card, headed towards the van, and drove to the pizza parlor.