ISEMA Newsletters
Witnessing at Work
Dear Christian friends,
One of our goals for this newsletter is to provide each of you with some practical help in witnessing for our Lord. Since most of you spend many hours each week at a job, I thought I’d start with some suggestions for witnessing at your workplace. God wants us to redeem the time. Our time at work should accomplish more than making money. Many Christians have led many people to Christ through their jobs. The great evangelist D.L.Moody got saved through the witness of a shoe salesman, while he was trying on some shoes. God wants to use you to witness to others at your job, as well as at other times. Here are some tips that I think will help you:
1. Get and keep your heart right with God. Confess and forsake any known sin. Spend time in prayer and God’s word in the morning before work. The more you are walking in the Spirit at work, the better witness you’ll be and the more you’ll hear God when He tells you to witness to someone. At the same time, don’t fall into condemnation, thinking you can’t witness because you aren’t “spiritual enough.” If you lose your temper at work (for example), apologize to those who were affected.
2. Choose the right job. Are you where God wants you? God used Jonah while he was running away from Him, but He would rather use us when we are in His perfect will. If you aren’t sure you are in the job God wants you to have, ask Him. If He wants you somewhere else, He’ll make it very clear to you. When you are preparing for future work or looking for a job, spend much time praying for God’s direction. Some jobs provide more opportunities than others to witness. This should be an important consideration in your job choice. Being used by God to witness at a job will greatly contribute to your happiness with that job.
- Let everyone know you are a Christian from the start. The longer you work at a job without telling people, the harder it will be to do so. Also, once you tell people you are a Christian, you will be conscious of your need to maintain a good witness before them. One easy way to do this is to send each co-worker and client a personal card or letter at Easter or Christmas with a clear gospel message in it, perhaps with your testimony in it.
4. Be sensitive to each person and to the Holy Spirit as to how much you should witness to them, and the best way to do so. Everyone reaches a place of crisis in their life at some time, when they are desperate for help. If they see you as a friend and a stable person, they will be likely to turn to you for counsel. Then they will listen eagerly as you share.
5. Avoid self-righteousness and legalism. Most people think of Christians this way. Let them see that your relationship with God is vital and gives you joy and peace, fulfillment and direction in your life. At the same time, we do need to take a stand as to what we will and won’t do at work. We must avoid all dishonesty and other immorality. It is better to leave your job than sin against our Lord.
6. Be a friend. Invite the person to your house for dinner. Or invite them to go with you to a “non-churchy” Christian event that you think they might enjoy. Don’t gossip about them or anyone else. That way, they won’t be afraid to confide in you.
7. Use tracts. Ron Woodruff from SOS Ministries worked at a glass factory when he got saved. He bought hundreds of comic-book tracts and left them in everyone’s lockers and everywhere around the factory. People avoided Ron because he wouldn’t listen to their dirty jokes and talked to them about Jesus. But they couldn’t deny the change they saw in his life. Within a few years, almost a third of the factory had gotten saved.
8. Become indispensable at your job. Be such a good worker that your boss can’t do without you. Your boss probably won’t mind if you witness to people as long as it doesn’t interfere with your work. Of course, this varies with the boss and the job. Once I worked at a hamburger stand and the manager (a Catholic) let me put tracts in the sack with each hamburger. Another time I worked as a cashier at a high-class restaurant. I witnessed to the waiters and quite a few customers. The owner thought it was cute and boasted of his “preacher-cashier.”
9. Don’t become a “workaholic.” Make sure your priorities are right. You need to spend time each day with God, spend time with your family, have regular church fellowship, spend time with friends, spend time in some kind of ministry activity, and have some time for rest and relaxation. If you find yourself working 50 or more hours a week, maybe you should look for a job with a better hourly wage, or simplify your lifestyle so you don’t spend so much.
Ministry News
From time to time, I try to give our workers a break from our regular outreaches in San Francisco and Berkeley. On Saturday July 27, we went to Santa Cruz to witness at the boardwalk. Thousands of youth, mostly from Bay Area suburbs, come to this beach. Most of the people I talked with believe in God and the Bible and were quite receptive to the gospel message. The people were actually eager to talk with us. Brandon gave one man a gospel tract and walked on. “Aren’t you supposed to preach to me?” the man asked. “Do you want me to?” Brandon replied. The man did, so he shared the gospel with him. Often we get so accustomed to being rejected that we are surprised when someone is eager to hear the gospel. Verna was amazed that she didn’t hear a single obscenity all day!
The following Saturday, we went to Shadow Cliff’s park in Pleasanton. Here, most of the people are Hispanic and many do not speak English. However, we had many good conversations with people and gave out a lot of Spanish tracts to those we couldn’t talk with.
Stuart has been helping us build our weekly outreach teams. In the past, we found that we got some new workers after SOS, but they would stop coming after a few weeks or months. He has been sending out a letter to team members sharing what is happening on the streets. He sent out three letters this past month. Also, he has been calling these people every week to encourage them. We are spending more time ministering to our team members during our prayer time before we go out. And we meet at the Vineyard after the Friday night outreach to share what happened that night, and to pray for one another and for the people we witnessed to. Often, Satan will use some negative experience on the streets to discourage a Christian from witnessing. This meeting provides an opportunity to minister to one another, so Satan’s attacks are thwarted.
On July 19, we witnessed in the Haight-Ashbury area. We met three teenagers, Adonis, Glori and Michael, who had just arrived in town from Hollywood. Adonis and Glori are sisters who had just been reunited. They had lived in foster homes and in abandoned houses for many years. They stayed at our house Friday night, and we were able to minister to them. They were open to the gospel, but not willing to submit to Christ at the time. Please pray for them.
On August 10, Paul Temple, Charles Simpson and a worship group from Sacramento came here to minister at the BART station. About 20 people came forward for prayer and a few wanted to receive Jesus. This group holds church meetings at the City Hall plaza in Sacramento every Sunday morning for five hours. They feed people, sing, preach, and share testimonies.
On Monday August 12, we did an outreach with eighty high school students from Grace Church in Long Beach. They ministered through song and drama at Lower Sproul Plaza in Berkeley. We were excited about the opportunity to work with this group, and help introduce them to street witnessing.
With three new people in our house, we felt the need to get away for a house retreat. From August 4-7, we went to the Lord’s Land, a beautiful Christian retreat center near Mendocino. We really enjoyed getting away from the city for a few days, and had a great time with the Lord and got to know one another better. In order to be effective in our evangelism ministry, we need to be unified as a house.
Coming Events
There are a number of exciting events coming up in September and October we want you to know about. On Saturday September 28, we will be joining the Full Gospel Business Men for an outreach to youth and gang members in San Jose at PAL Stadium, from noon to 7 PM. A number of local churches and inner city outreaches will be involved in this outreach, which will include a free barbecue, music, and testimonies of ex-gang members. Over the past two months, an intensive outreach called California for Jesus has been ministering daily to drug addicts and gang members throughout the Bay Area. Many of these people are getting saved. For more information about the September 28 outreach, contact Dan at 408-370-3688.
The 1991 National Street Ministries Conference will be held in Dallas from September 26-29. Guest speakers include Mario Murillo, Sonny Arguinzoni, Chuck Girard, Ray Comfort, and Tommy Barnett. This is a great opportunity to receive training in evangelism and to meet hundreds of other Christians involved in street ministry. For more information, contact Scott Hinkle Outreach Ministries, Box 380306, Duncanville, TX 75138, (214) 283-3900.
The Northern California Worship Celebration will be held in Sacramento September 27-29 (note correct dates). The Northern California Prophesy Conference will be held in Sacramento October 3-5 at Capital Christian Center. Many of today’s leading Bible teachers will discuss modern events as they relate to the Bible. Confirmed speakers include David Hocking, Chuck Smith, Jack Hayford, Chuck Swindoll, Ray Stedman and Earl Radmacher. For more information about either event, contact New Hope Christian Fellowship, 1650 Tribute Rd., Sacramento, CA 95815, (916) 649-9064.
On Saturday October 12, we will have a rally at the Powell St. BART Station. New Life Christian Church will lead us in worship here, as they did throughout SOS. It will be a powerful time of ministry. They will be ministering again with us on Saturday November 9, same time and place.
We have a new area code in Oakland – 510. So our SOS Ministries phone number is now 510-531-5325. Many of you ordered SOS tapes last month. Our main tape duplicator just broke so these tapes may be slow in arriving. Please pray that it will get fixed soon. Also, the SOS Video won’t be ready for a few months. A friend has some editing equipment and will help us with this project. We’ll let you know when it’s ready. Our Tape of the Month is “Preparing for Warfare” by Mario Murillo. This powerful teaching was given at the SOS-San Francisco outreach in 1989. God is preparing an army who will bring in a harvest in these last days.
Yours in His love,
Larry Rosenbaum
