I recently read the biography of Brother Andrew, and while I
admire his boldness, his “derry-doo”, and his consistency, the constant
mysticism of the book wore on me. Simply defined, Andrew’s mysticism frequently
told him to go to embassies for visas, call a certain young lady, and visit
specific people. That is not the way we hear from God and, while I don’t doubt
Andrew’s veracity for a moment, I think such writing leads others to wonder why
God is not speaking so specifically and accurately to them. That said, on my
rescheduled connecting flight just after takeoff I had the very definite
mystical feeling that I would not survive the flight. It was creepy to say the
least, and it led to an excellent time of prayer including confession,
commitment of my family to God’s sovereign care, and an inventory of my
ministry and affections.
Needless to say, I survived the flight and my feeling was
not a premonition from God. But I determined to redeem my layover, and indeed
my entire trip for the glory of God. Landing in Frankfurt I purchased a train
ticket to the city centre, I missed the first train by seconds and had to wait twelve minutes for the next. It is nice to know when the end of a public sermon
is coming for the sake of time and brevity and clarity, and so I waited until a
crowd formed on the platform for the next train and, using a tactic of Brother
Andrew, I gave them greetings from the United States and from the Kingdom of
Heaven. When the train arrived I was less than thrilled with the response, but
several dozen people heard the gospel and then boarded the train.
Arriving at the city centre I was impressed with the city
planning and the beautiful small parks throughout, but there were no crowds, so
I made my way towards a Frankfurt landmark I recognized from somewhere, a
beautiful round glass building. To my surprise and happiness I also found the
river, which has a long meandering park on either side of its bank. I walked a
few hundred yards until I found people lounging on the grass in any direction,
and I preached on the authority of the Christian to preach and the imperative
of the hearer to be reconciled to God from 2 Corinthians 5. While many
listened, I was again disappointed with the response.
I knew I could spend the entire day on this expanse of river
so I walked down about a half mile until I found a large crew unloading trucks
into a large pleasure yacht for what looked like a sizeable and expensive
party. I set up facing the yacht in hopes that my voice would echo from the
yacht for greater distance. As I preached many stopped to listen, and as I
finished my new friend Thorsten Winters approached from the newspaper and asked
if he could ask me some questions. On the plane I literally had just read Albert Mohler’s wisdom
on the broadcast power of the news media. Not only had my voice echoed off the
yacht, but it was also going to reverberate from a newspaper! See Thorsten's Article Here. After a quite
pleasant conversation I decided I would find something to eat then continue my
circuit down the river.
But as I came up into the city centre again I found a
beautiful park that has the largest metal EU (European Union) logo I’ve ever
seen firmly posted on stilts at the entrance. There were Japanese tourists,
Chinese tourists, Arabic tourists, and many locals drawn to that giant logo.
The park was crowded so I started to look for my best location, when I noticed
a beautiful little hill almost directly at the center. As I ascended the mount
I was pleased to note that the wind would at my back if I was facing the
largest concentration of people and thus carry my voice over the crowd.
As I preached the response was what every open-air preacher hopes
for. Everyone turned their attention towards me, passers by stopped walking and
sat on benches or in the grass. At least three listeners started to record the
sermon. I preached on peace with the Kingdom of Heaven, and after I called for
repentance and faith I thanked the recorders for recording the sermon and
encouraged them to watch it again later and post it to the internet. I
concluded that I would love to have a reasoned conversation with anyone who
would like to and that I had approximately four hours to catch my flight. A
group of four middle-eastern college aged young men who I thought at first were
hostile to the preaching all gave me enthusiastic thumbs ups.
I considered heading over to them when a young man named Eddins waved and
called me to speak with him. Eddins was in his mid-20s and spoke English quite
well, I expected him to be hostile because his first question was what I
thought of the United States Army. But he was ready for a reasoned conversation
and we both agreed that the lack of faith in the United States Army has led to
terrible outcomes. A young Christian jumped into the conversation and
encouraged me for the sermon but also rebuked me to spend more time forming
relationships. I half laughed and said, “Brother, I have nine hours to preach
to this whole city.” He saw my point and I encouraged him to keep building
relationships and preaching the gospel and that faith comes through hearing and
hearing the Word of Christ.
Eddins professed to be a Muslim, but admitted that he had
not found time to read the Koran. We spent quite a bit of time on textual
criticism of both the Bible and the Koran. He said he found the Koran too hard
and deep to understand, to which I responded that the Koran itself claims to be
a light and perspicuous book. We both agreed that it is not. I helped him to
understand that the Bible we are reading today is the Bible that was originally
written thousands of years ago. He seemed pleased but didn’t want to let the
conversation go, so I invited him to lunch (it was now dinner time).
As we were eating I did form a relationship with him,
talking about his upbringing and his career and his aspirations, all the while
answering and discussing the things of God. He told me that the name Eddins is
a variation of Adam, but that he did not know why his parents had named him
that because he had no family members named Eddins. I took him to the story of
Zechariah naming his son Johannes despite having no ancestral precedent for it, but
that God would be gracious to John in the future. I asked Eddins what he knew
about Adam and he knew the story of the fall, then I asked him about the Second
Adam, of whom he did not know that was a title of Isa, the Christ. I implied
that perhaps his parents had named him Eddins on God’s promptings so that
someday he would put his hope in the Second Eddins.
It was then that Eddins told me he was supposed to leave
Frankfurt the day prior but his bus had broken down, and that he had been
sitting in the park wondering how he would spend his afternoon before his bus
left at the same time I needed to get on a train for the airport. He was very
pleased that we had met and he told me he didn’t think it was a coincidence.
I don’t think it was a coincidence either. Pray for my
friend Eddins!
