Pastors John Sherwood and Peter Simpson were proclaiming the urgency of fleeing to the Lord Jesus Christ for salvation in the centre of Uxbridge on January 9th, helped by a faithful group of local Christians.
The preaching afforded real encouragement to some passing Christians who were thrilled that a forthright public proclamation of God’s truth was taking place.
Mrs Pilkington had a useful conversation with a Sikh gentleman, who took a booklet of Bible verses explaining the plight of man emanating from Adam’s first rebellion, the revelation of the coming Messiah in the Old Testament period, and then the Lord’s appearing and the way of salvation in Him. The witnessing sister has spoken to this man before, and they have built up a constructive relationship. He agreed about the dire spiritual state of the nation.
He then asked some searching questions such as, Why God allows sin and evil if He is in control; why did He not just make everything good?
This provided a good opening to explain from Genesis the fall of man – that it was man’s own choice to rebel against God – and that since the Fall all people come into the world with fallen natures and sinful hearts. The only remedy for this predicament is faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. May the Lord open this Sikh man’s heart to his own need of the Saviour, as he reads the literature given to him.
A further conversation took place with a young man who questioned one of the posters on display which stated that anxiety about climate change was a fruit of society’s unbelief and of an abandonment of the authority of the Bible, which tells us that the Lord is in control of His creation.
Pastor Sherwood explained to the young man how the existential fear being generated by politicians and the media over climate climate is refuted by the plain teaching of God’s word in Genesis 8:22, which assures us that there will be regular variations in weather patterns and temperatures in the world as long as it lasts :
“While the earth remaineth, seedtime and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night shall not cease” (Genesis 8:22).
During his preaching Pastor Simpson emphasised the reality of 2 Corinthians 5:10 which declares,
“For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ; that every one may receive the things done in his body, according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad”.
The minister then declared in relation to this text, “Whether you are a Jew, or a Buddhist, or a Sikh, or a Hindu, or a Muslim, or an agnostic, or an atheist, or a fashionable liberal secularist (one who embraces all the woke philosophies of our day), all will have to stand before Jesus Christ and give an account of why you ignored His gospel and refused to humble yourself before Him.
May many who heard this message in Uxbridge upon this day realise that there is coming a “day when God shall judge the secrets of men by Jesus Christ” (Romans 2:16), and may they respond in repentance and faith, whilst there is still time.
