October, 1999
SOS-San Francisco Outreach Report
Dear Christian friends,
For the past 20 years, we have sent out an “SOS” call for Christians
to help us reach the people of San Francisco for Jesus. Each
year, God has been faithful to bring many Christians to help us
reach this city. This year, teams of Christians joined us from
Canada, and from Salem, Oregon, and from Redding, Paradise,
Leggett and Riverside, California.
We were blessed to meet at Glad Tidings Church this year. We had
held our SOS outreach in this church from 1981-1986. They have a
large facility for meetings, sleeping, meals, and even a parking
lot. Our workers took showers at the YMCA two blocks away. We are
so grateful to Pastor Jeff Green and the rest of the Glad Tidings
congregation for opening up this wonderful facility to us.
On Saturday morning, evangelist Mario Murillo spoke to our group,
giving a word of encouragement and congratulating us for 20 years
of outreach in this city. Mario is involved in a major outreach in
San Francisco this summer, culminating with a week of meetings at
the Cow Palace in October.
That afternoon we held a five hour worship rally at United Nations
Plaza in downtown San Francisco. This area is filled with homeless
people, drug addicts and drug dealers. We prayed with many people
that afternoon, including Ray, a security guard who had been a
crack addict for 13 years.
A week before the outreach, a friend told me about Arthur Blessitt’s
web site. When I looked at it, I noticed that he was planning to be in
San Francisco during SOS week. I e-mailed him and he responded
that he would be happy to speak at our outreach.
Over the past 30 years, Arthur Blessitt has carried a cross for
33,000 miles — in every sovereign nation on earth. He has wit
nessed to world leaders and thousands of other people on his
journeys. He also was arrested 24 times and once faced a firing
squad. On Tuesday and Wednesday nights, he shared some of the
things God had taught him through these experiences. We joined
him on a cross walk through San Francisco on Monday and Wednesday
afternoon. On Wednesday, he preached at Justin Herman Plaza. His
involvement in this year’s outreach was a great encouragement to
us.
This year, San Francisco has restricted our permits. It is hard
to get a permit over an hour long anywhere in the city on a week
day. However on Tuesday, we managed to get a four hour permit at
Haight and Masonic Street. We kept our volume so low that people
across the street could barely hear us. Still, a police officer
ordered us to turn down our volume even further.
Fortunately, this was the only time the San Francisco police
complained about our sound level all week. The police could have
arrested us and confiscated our sound system at any time, as they
did last year, but this never happened.
Mark Zulim took two days off work to attend the SOS outreach on
Monday and Tuesday. On Monday, he had two long conversations with
Michael and Peter at Justin Herman Plaza in the financial dis
trict. Michael prayed with him to rededicate his life to Christ.
Peter was a Hindu, but was open to Mark’s witness. Amazingly,
Mark saw both Michael and Peter the next day at Haight and Masonic and spoke with them further. This is a totally different part
of the city, filled with hippies, not businessmen.
On Wednesday night, some Christians from Michael Long’s team met
a family of five from Lake Elsinore who had locked their keys in
their van at Fisherman’s Wharf. They witnessed to them, and the
whole family said they wanted to receive Christ. They had been
waiting for a tow truck for over an hour. At 10:52 PM, they
prayed that a tow truck would come before 11 PM. At 10:59 PM a
tow truck (not the one they called) drove by. The driver stopped
and unlocked their van for them.
Also that night, Paul and Noreen Coca saw some street kids on
Haight Street that they had witnessed to in San Jose. They invited
them to get a hamburger at McDonalds. By the time they got there,
20 street kids had joined them. The restaurant wouldn’t let the kids
inside, but Paul and Noreen bought them hamburgers and wit
nessed to all the kids. They also prayed with several of the
kids.
Castro Street is the center of militant homosexuality. On Thursday
night, some Christians were praying for a divine appointment on
Castro Street. A minute later, a man approached them and said he
wanted to be saved. They prayed with him. On another night Greg,
who came from a Christian family in Atlanta, prayed with some
Christians on Castro Street. He said he wanted to get out of the gay
lifestyle and came to Glad Tidings the next day.
Andre gave his testimony at our Friday service. He had been a
Mormon, but some Christians had witnessed to him in the Haight
and he felt that God was leading him out of the Mormon church. He
joined us for our outreaches on Friday and Saturday.
On Friday night, Derek Scholl witnessed to Christy, a psychic
woman on Haight Street. As he spoke with her, she started to cry.
She said, “I know that what you’re saying is the truth.”
Please pray for those whom we prayed with that week, and who re
ceived a gospel witness, including George, Marcus, Laurence,
Yolanda, Dimitri, T.C., Ralph, Craig and Guy (SF), Armando, Lucy,
Jessica, Jacki, Margaret and Lucy (Lake Elsinore, CA), Chandra
(San Luis Obispo, CA), and Emma (Brentwood, CA).
