"These things I have spoken to you, that in Me you may have peace. In the world you have tribulation, but take courage; I have overcome the world." John 16:33 (NASB)
If you've never gone to the streets to share God's love, you have missed the scariest and best time of your life. And if you do go, more than a few times, you may find that you are never again satisfied with life as you once knew it. What could I possibly mean by scariest and best? How can those things coexist?
Well, we're all afraid of rejection. We're afraid of the unknown. We feel vulnerable in a place that isn't really familiar to us. And face it, the streets are an unfamiliar place for most Christians.
If you share your faith you might experience rejection. That's scary. If you step out into unfamiliar territory someone might have a question you can't answer; or someone might openly ridicule you. It can also be petrifying to know that you might see real people, not so different from you, who have huge needs that you don't know how to meet. It can also be scary to think that you might be placing yourself in a vulnerable position; that you might not always be completely safe. It's scary to think that God might even ask you to do something where you have to trust Him and Him alone.
These are all frightening concepts. But once you take that first step and feel the delicious rush of exhilaration that comes from an encounter where God is obviously working in someone's heart; when you see a light go on in a woman's eyes or pray with a man who is inviting Jesus to live inside of him, you may find yourself willing to die to that fear in the hope that God will again use you do make a difference in someone's life.
From the beginning, street ministry was a big part of what we did in Agape Force. If we were having meetings we would go to the streets and invite people in. Sometimes we gave out tickets, or flyers, but many times we'd just bring people ourselves, right off the street and then go back for more.
But we didn't need meetings to hit the streets. Often the meetings themselves were right there in the street. Sometimes we'd just go out and find someone to talk to.
Many years after my Agape Force experiences, when I had a family and a normal job, and my time was spent in what most folks would consider average ways, I found myself working in a building where we sometimes had contact with "street" people. I was appalled at the loathing my fellow workers had for these poor, lost folk, how afraid they were of them and how much they would go out of their way to avoid speaking to or looking at them.
One such day a rush of memories from my AF days came flooding back to me, and at lunch I went walking until I found a homeless woman sitting on a bench. I took her to lunch, shared God's love with her and tried to put her in touch with the Christian ministries I knew of in the area that might be able to help her.
If it hadn't been for my days in the Force, where I traded in some of my fear for the love of Jesus, I knew I'd have felt pretty much the same way about her as the others in my office did. I thank God for the times we had then, for the things we learned and the souls that came to know Him through our obedience.
Here are a few wonderful stories about our times in the streets.
Dee Patton