With a team of 25 people I travelled to the former East German city of Leipzig to experience Easter with a renewed focus and resolve to see the resurrected Christ preached. We called our weekend Easter2Go which focused solely on preaching the risen Christ to a city that is often referred to as the Atheist Capital of Germany. As believers we need to be so aware that this is the biggest weekend on the Christian Calendar as it is Resurrection weekend. Christ has risen!! Hallelujah! The power of salvation, the invitation to come into the family of God and to proclaim the coming Kingdom of God is just as real in 2011 as it was the year the first disciples celebrated our Lord and Savior raised from the dead just out of Jerusalem .
We took our first evening together to build community, to pray, to worship and to dig deeper into the Scriptures so that our weekend would be drenched in the confidence of the Holy Spirit's anointing. Some of us were experienced in evangelism, some of us were new to the faith, some of us are educated pastors and others are taking their first baby steps into the Great Commission that continues to be excercised today. And though we came from various parts of Germany and with different set of experiences, we came to proclaim one Lord, one Savior and one Hope for the world, namely Jesus Christ...the Risen One!
The words of Martin Luther followed me to Leipzig ''The Kingdom is to be in the midst of your enemies. And he who will not suffer this does not want to be of the Kingdom of Christ; he wantes to be among firends, to sit among roses and lilies, not with the bad people but the devout people. O you blasphemers and betrayers of Christ. If Christ had done what you are doing who would ever have been spared?''
On our first day of going into the inner city, we came into contact with a host of different people. From those who wanted to sunbathe in the burning sun, those who walked aimlessly through the streets shopping, those who called the streets their home, tourists, strict atheists, devout believers and everything in the mix. We put up a cross and began singing through the tunes that believers have sung through the church age. What was our theme you ask? The Risen Christ!
Were we welcomed? By some yes. Many were grateful to be reminded of the message and the life that Jesus offers. Some have heard it for the first time. It is absolutely astonishing to see a person hear the gospel for the very first time and receive it in faith for what it is. I am so grateful to the gospel that I have been able to study at bible college, but the opportunity of presenting it simply to someone who has no foundation of faith...I must confess that was a new challenge even for me.
Many were aggressive toward us, denying any fantasty to do with faith and calling us perthatic for wasting our time. One man in particular placed himself in the middle of the street for everyone to see, yelling with everything that His lungs ''JESUS WHERE ARE YOU??? WHY ARE YOU HIDING?'' With full conviction the man turned toward the team and said with an anger that I have rarely encountered...''If I could, I would nail all of you to that cross too!'' Is the spiritual battle real? I think so.
We were able to see a total of 31 people come to the Lord that one single day. Some team members expressed that the conviction of the Spirit was very strong on some of these individuals who decided to give their lives to follow Jesus. Though we do not know some of the reasons behind those decisions, yet I rejoice that the Lord will continue to work in the lives of each of these individuals.
On day two we performed various skits that presented the gospel through open air preaching. We invited people to come to the Lord for salvation. We had a number of disturbances that came from punks and homeless who wanted to distract the audience of people that had gathered to hear and see what we had to say. One 82 year old woman who I came in contact with spoke to me about having lived her hard life without ever needing a god, so she asked me why she needed one now. I in turn asked her where she receives her hope for this life and for the one to come. Her response saddned me deeply; with the deepest of convitions in her eyes she said to me ''Dear boy, I have no hope!!'' I was able to pray with her, but she continued to battle the existence of God. We sent out groups of two and three into the city centre to be lead by the Spirit to speak with people who needed to hear the gospel. On day two we were able to record another 21 people making decisions to lay their own lives down for the life that Jesus offers. It was a weekend to rejoice! As Jesus foretold ''The harvest is plentiful'' (Matthew 9:37). Our hope is that people will heed the words of Jesus and participate in the work of the Kingdom of God.
The Easter weekend may be over, but what happend on that day generations ago in the small land of Palestine still has signficant ramifications for us today. The life of Jesus is still as powerful as it was two thousand years ago and we can still see the Spirit of God renewing us to go out and preach the best news that has ever been told to the world....
...''The grave is empty...He is Risen!!''
