Mark is married to Jo and is a 23 year old youth and schools worker based in South Cave (near Hull). Mark spent 4 years as a youth worker in Peterborough whilst studying for a degree in youth work & ministry with Oasis.
Last week (2 sundays ago) at church Jo and myself met Fred*. Fred wandered in at the end of church, looked at the large bible at the front, sat down then moved outside the church where we also were so naturally we started talking to him.
Fred told us that he had just read something in the bible, sat down and prayed for his family and then gone to read it again only to find it had gone…as if it was never even there, he reassured us that he wasn’t on drugs and told us his experience again. (We believed him the first time…God works in funny ways!).
So we stayed talking to Fred for a while after everyone else had left and he shared with us his story…a year and a half ago Fred’s parents were killed in a car crash, suffering a nervous breakdown he then ended up leaving his fiance and becoming homeless until a week before he met us (he was homeless for a year) when he’d moved to Great Yarmouth and found himself a flat and was now trying to get himself some nice clothes, a job interview and his life back on track.
Needing to leave Fred reassured us that he would come to church the following week and we said we’d go for a drink and chat after…sadly Fred didn’t show up however I don’t think that matters too much.
The reason I share this is because when talking to someone else about it he seemed surprised that we listened to him and even offered to go for a proper chat the following week yet to me it doesn’t seem unnatural, in fact it seemed to me exactly what Jesus would have done.
The first person Jesus revealed himself to was the women at the well…she wasn’t an angel…quite the opposite. She had 5 husbands and was living with a man she wasn’t married to, she had to go to a well in the middle of the day because her village hated her…yet Jesus met with her, Jesus talked with her, Jesus loved her and accepted her.
Park Baptist in Yarmouth seems to be moving away from being a middle class church and that’s fantastic because I’m convinced that if Jesus was here in the flesh he’d be seeking out people like Fred. So I finish this post by saying go and do like-wise…if someone like Fred comes in your church talk to Him…offer him a meal and even if he never returns pray that God would do the rest…it’s all about the seeds!
*name changed
