Tuesday, October 25, 2011

Project Heart Changer

Today was the long-anticipated Project Heart Changer.  This outreach, in partnership with Living Waters, set out to distribute copies of the 180 Movie on DVD to college and university campuses across the country.  We set Baldwin Wallace College as our destination.

After enduring record-setting amounts of rainfall, we were delighted to have a day with blue skies and sunshine with temperatures climbing into the 60's.  We got set up right around 9:30 AM.  God blessed us with a great team of 11 people, ready to serve the Lord.

Heading into 10:00 AM, there was a rush of students that lasted until just after 10:15.  We got off to a good start.  There were a lot of students who declined the DVD, but most took it.  It was interesting to see how many students were texting or listening to iPods as they walked.  That's OK - we just made sure to talk loud enough to get their attention!  In that first wave, I only encountered one person who seemed bent out of shape that we were there.  He didn't seem to indicate that he knew anything about the video.  I was set up at a corner with one other team member and we happened to be in front of a church.  He snapped at us asking if the church knew we were on their property.  He wasn't happy that I reminded him that we were on a public sidewalk.

We ran into slow time while classes were in session that lasted until around 11:00 AM, with an occasional straggler here and there.  The next wave of students brought another steady flow of people accepting the video.  Not much in terms of conversations, though.  At one point, a woman driving by in a car stopped and asked if she could have whatever it was we were giving away!

Things picked up again after 11:30 as the lunch rush came out.  With the bulk of the team set up at the busiest corner, I set off with one another team member to head down towards the dorms and the student union.  We were able to give out several DVD's down that way.  By the time we got back to the group, we only had a hand full of videos left.  I grabbed a last couple and headed to some of the side streets.  After giving away the remaining videos in hand, I made my way back to the group.  I was met on the way by another team member who was coming to inform me that we had some protesters.  It turned out to be two female students who set up right next to us with "Honk if you are Pro-Choice" signs.  They were encouraging students not to take the final few videos we were trying to give out.  As I got there, though, one team member was engaging one of the girls in conversation while another team member was talking to the second girl.  I do believe that both young ladies had received copies of the video earlier, and one said she would go and watch it.  As militant as they were in their convictions, I do appreciate that they kept their protest to the issue and did not seem to want to try and heckle us or attack us personally.  While both young ladies were engaged in the one-to-one conversations with our team members, that distracted them long enough to give away the final few videos without them telling people not to.

After all the videos had been given away, team members proceeded to hand out Gospel tracts and engage people in one-to-one conversations.  Including down time, it took us 2.5 hours to give away the DVD's.  That was followed by about a half hour of additional evangelism, for a total of 3 hours on site.

At least one professor took a DVD and was interested in showing it to her class because it discussed the Holocaust, which her class was now dealing with.  As improbable as it seems, pray that she does end up showing the movie to her class.  I was also able to give a copy to someone who works with a crisis pregnancy center.  Please pray that the video can help those she works with.

I praise God for a wonderful day at Baldwin Wallace.  Pray for those who received the 600 videos we gave away, as well as the work that took place all across the country today.

By the way, the protest signs did elicit a resounding symphony of car horns.  In addition, if you glance through the comments left on the 180 Movie YouTube page, you get a taste of how people feel about this issue.  Our nation is in desperate need of prayer.  I saw one comment that said something to the idea that a fetus is nothing more than a parasite sucking life from the mother.  Please pray.  Please.  We cannot change these types of attitudes, but nothing is impossible with God!

View a list of all the campuses reached today.

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