Post by Messenger Micah on Nov 11, 2005 22:52:31 GMT -5
Joining me to South Beach this week were Doug, John and Onica, and Emmanuel (Elizabeth was not able to go). The beach was back to normal as far as being populated and we had difficult time parking. We ended up parking further north than usual on Hispanola Street.
We prayed, set up the banners, and began walking and preaching to every creature. We were further north than the homosexual bar ?The Palace? so we had to pass by it. We set up with our banners and I stood on the step-up platform and began preaching. I had a very large, heckling, crowd with many stopping to listen. The homosexuals sat in front of me, took pictures next to me, came out and did prolonged kisses in the street, etc. (See pictures at www.pbase.com/lautermilch/repent). After preaching about 10 minutes the police showed up and watched me. I finished preaching and as we began to walk away, the police talked to Doug and I. They did not tell us we could not do what we were doing, but felt we were going about this all wrong and gave me some of their advice on how we should witness to the homosexuals (see pictures-white and black officer with myself).
As I finished talking with the police, defending our methods to them, the team moved down to the Lummus Park sign and began preaching. John, Onica, Doug, and Emmanuel all took turns preaching. All had hecklers (see pictures of some hecklers). Emmanuel had one short black guy (I think he was Jamaican), who heckled him for a long time but I do not know what he had a problem with since he professed to be a Christian. I told him to go preach somewhere else since he was so on fire to share the Word of God and stop interfering with us.
Most of the time the preaching was going on here I was engaged in a conversation with a Christian man from Pennsylvania who had watched us preach at the Palace Bar and interact with the police. He was interested and receptive. I also witnessed to a few others as he watched on.
It was now getting dark and we headed down to in front of the Clevelander bar. Doug and I went around to the side of the building where the homeless congregate for shelter, and gave them bagged lunches and preached to them.
We decided to head to the street corners and try some new spots. We set up at the corner of 10th and Washington and Doug preached. He was able to engage a group of young white guys from England who were very proud, ignorant of the Bible (they did not think so), and ungodly. We effectively witnessed to them, refuted their arguments, answered their questions, but they would not acknowledge truth, and admitted they loved their sin and were not interested in forsaking it. They did take a free Bible though.
We then moved down to the corner of 12th and Washington. I set up the step-up platform and started preaching. I preached here for about 40 minutes. Shortly after I started, the same short Jamaican black guy came up and started heckling me. I refuted all his arguments with scriptures and continued preaching. After this went on a few minutes, a tall African American guy started telling him to leave us alone. When the short guy responded, the tall guy pulled a knife on him. All this happened right in front of me, but I continued preaching. The short guy was on his knees begging the tall guy to come and stab him. After a few minutes, thankfully the tall guy walked away, and the short guy left also in the other direction. Many people passed by, several would stop and listen for a while and then move on. Onica also preached here.
We then moved down with our goal being to preach in front of the wicked Club Madonna (see pictures). This bar shows women dancing on screen right in front of the bar on the street. On our way down we had a good witness/rebuke to a group of about 8 young guys and girls from California (see pictures).
When we arrived at Club Madonna John set up the step-up platform and started preaching just to the side of the club. I stood directly in front acting as an audience. There was a vanload of young guys right in front of me outside of the club. They were listening to John some and started asking me questions and mocking. I began to engage them and after a while they left in the van.
At this point a homeless black man who we have met before asked me if we had any food. We had already given out all of our food, so I offered to buy him some pizza at the Pizza place a few stores down. When I came back out after giving the homeless man the food, the guys from the van were out there again. No one was preaching so I just started preaching and rebuking them directly in front of Club Madonna. The team had gotten engaged in witnessing to others off to the side and it was pretty heated.
Suddenly I had a good-sized audience of about 20-25 people standing around listening to me (see pictures). The young guys from the van heckled me, the bouncers sat outside heckling some, but mostly listening, and others stopped. I preached on this way for about 20 minutes with no interference. I believe it was very effective. Someone brought me the step-up platform and I stood on top of it and continued preaching. After a few minutes the manager came out and told me I could not preach directly in front of the club. I was just about to stop anyway, so I stepped down, offered the listeners tracts, and walked away.
As I joined the rest of the team, they had encountered two young black homosexuals, one who was very verbose (see pictures). We witnessed to them as we walked back until he became so angry he walked away.
We were waiting at a street corner for Doug, when I spotted three young African American guys who were listening attentively as I preached in front of Club Madonna. I began to witness to them and they were very polite, quiet, and seemed to be receptive. At this point an African American couple walked by and the man made the comment ?Biblical illiteracy!? I did not know if he was talking about me or the young guys, but I asked him if he was a Christian, was he living for God, holy, etc. I probably should have ignored this man and stayed focused on the three young guys. This guy began to tell me everybody sins, nobody is perfect, only Jesus can judge, etc. I corrected him with the scriptures but he would not hear it, made excuses, gave opinions, and walked off. Doug came and picked us up with the van.