Today, we broke into women’s and men’s groups for breakfast. Some of the students helped cook and the men had food and fellowship in the cafeteria and the women ate at Golden Corral.
A former HSE graduate, Anne Kingston, joined us for the day from Dayton, Ohio. She shared a lot of wisdom with us and is very kind and outgoing. Debbie Villoria joined us for breakfast, too. It was a great bonding time for each of the groups and a great chance to learn more about each other and from each other.
After breakfast, we all went to the Circle Center mall downtown to evangelize. Michael Villoria did table card tricks in the cafeteria and the students spread out and talked with people.
A high-school band competition was going on at the stadium nearby so there were a lot of students in the mall. We had many opportunities for conversations. We got to encourage many of the band students to seek out God.
Then we drove to HHOOT ministries to serve the homeless. We helped serve lunch, sort and organize clothing, and got to talk and pray with the people. Shannon, Ezekiel, Brian, Chris and Monique talked to their friend Ryan (recovering heroin addict mentioned in other posts). Chris related to him and encouraged him because he endured a similar past. Brian told him he should give his life to Jesus and that God would give him the strength to resist the addiction and temptation to relapse. They prayed for him and invited him to Horizon Central. He was excited to check it out.
We had pizza together for dinner, then we separated into three groups for the evening. One group set up for Sunday school, a second group did childcare for the pastors and staff on campus so that they could go on dates, and the third group went back downtown for street evangelism. Michael Villoria came downtown and did street illusions. They opened up the door for many conversations about Jesus. Later, we split into groups and spread out through the town. God opened up a lot of opportunities for engaging talks.
