Introduction
I arrived in Scotland on a Friday evening, July 12, 2024, and signs of cultural zeitgeist appeared on my first walk through Glasgow. A couple of girls on my tram from the airport to Edinburgh showed physical affection. As I walked from the Glasgow train station to find my hotel and dinner, many young people were drunk and running about the streets dressed in underclothes. A drinking man at the neighboring restaurant table had no shame to grope his girlfriend. I am under no illusion that American youth have more spiritual health, but drinking and the consequent lack of self control is more prevalent at younger ages. I speculate this is due to the lower drinking age of 18 and widespread public transportation into the city.
Our mission team of men met in the mornings for hymn singing and prayer at a nearby hotel before going into the streets for preaching and evangelism. We met with a group of six Scotsmen, including two local church elders, who are already street preaching and evangelizing each Saturday morning: Dermot, Ken, John, Brian, Ross, and Jamie. In fact these men contacted Jeff Rose to request this group visit. Many of the visiting men are senior pastors or missionaries. We had American missionaries Daniel in Nepal and Michael in Romania. Jeff Rose, Chuck O’Neal, and Jim Thornton are American senior pastors, and Dia Moodley and Peter Sherwood are senior pastors in England. We also had several brothers who street preach in America: Joseph Schmidt, Adam Albright, Jerardo Ibarra, Cody Torres, Joe Anderson, and Will Dieterich. Several of the latter are also in seminary. Needless to say, I was joining a group of men with far greater evangelism experience and boldness than I had.
Trip Summary
I saw God’s sovereignty ordaining the conversations throughout the trip.
The mission lasted eight days.For seven days I stood on streets and street corners, calling to passersby and handing out tracts for seven hours most days. We usually only snacked on food we brought for lunch and sometimes had a group dinner and sometimes a quick dinner before evening street preaching.
During these days, I had ten gospel conversations the first day and an average of five gospel conversations per day.
On Monday, I had lost my voice completely to start the day. I was speaking as I could while handing out tracts though little sound came out. By midday I was tired after a cup of tea and I considered resting for the afternoon. However, I prayed to the Lord to bless my perseverance, and He answered my prayer with healing. Despite not resting and using what little voice I could muster, my voice came back completely in the afternoon. I was able to share the gospel with a Muslim lady visiting from Iraq, a young Scottish man, and a homosexual man who approached our group.
- God preserved unity even as nonbelievers sought to sow discord: JW at Dundee b/t me and Ken.
- God preserved faith even as nonbelievers even accused us of sharing a false gospel, of being spiritually blinded and sought to propagate their beliefs.
- God preserved freedom even as Daniel was arrested for a few hours in Glasgow, and we were seriously questioned in Dundee. Fortunately, we had the gospel tracts with many verses and avoided the default one.
- God preserved safety even as Muslim men/boys were kicking soccer balls at the preacher and us one night and as some pride marchers became a little with our speaker.
- God blessed us with Christian encouragement: multiple families and older couples who thanked us for our work: couple at Dundee, Canadian couple in Glasgow, NC family in Edinburgh, and other shorter thanks from Christian passersby. Some young men thanked us for our examples: Rukas who came to the 7pm as one example.
The Scots
While we met a wide variety of religious followers on the streets, they all believe in some form of works-based salvation besides the believers:
Pagans: Celtic Pagan Moss, unnamed Egyptian god worshipper, Goth Pagan Danielle. The college age girl Moss who is a pagan and former atheist thanked me for educating her on the gospel.
Muslims: boy who said he’d compare Bible and Quran, two Pakistani Muslims, Muslim lady from Iraq
Roman Catholics: A&A couple, Catholic man who argued, Romeo, older Catholic lady with pink hair.
Agnostics: Anthony, young man who took Bible/Washer videos, Shannon, Paul
Professing believers who don’t understand gospel: Sarah, cyclist from Church of Scotland
Seekers: Ryan/Candice/Sierra, Kenzie, Nathan, Lucy, girl who took tract twice when her friend threw the first away.
New age: Russian Pavel, Edinburgh man
Jehovah’s Witnesses: man in Dundee, Vladimir stand in Glasgow
Unspecified: Karen, two sitting girls at Dundee, two standing boys at Dundee, two girls with piercings in Glasgow.
Homosexuals: man near concert hall, two girls on King Arthur’s seat
A girl wearing a Nirvana shirt took a tract and listened as I explained that she should follow Christ who is alive and not Kurt Cobain who killed himself. I showed my care in telling her how I also bought his CD at her age, and I had to stop listening to it because it was depressing. She listened intently to me, and I pray she rejects the message of death by Nirvana.
Several talked about how they struggled with depression. However, I made no promises of mental health as a primary benefit while sharing the gospel. The only promise is peace with God and forgiveness for eternal life which will often lead to better mental health.
We experienced wonderful hospitality on the Lord’s Day. The small church held a morning and evening service with a long barbecue meal and fellowship in between.
On the last mission day we went to a pride parade and held signs with Bible verses. Preaching was done there to call them to repentance out of love not self righteousness. It was sad to see young children being led through a parade full of depravity and sexual immorality with loudly blasting bass music.
Conclusion
I am writing this on October 5, 2024, over two months later. The main lasting impact of this trip might be from my experience with the men, pastors and missionaries. They are bold. They are courageous to speak the truth in love in the open air, like Spurgeon and Whitfield. They have conviction and are committed to the gospel in their cities in the US, Dallas, Houston, Portland, San Francisco, and the UK, Bristol, Manchester, on streets and on college campuses. Lord give us more men like these in the church of God. In a rapidly dying and confused culture, the harvest is plentiful and the workers are few.
Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to keep all that I commanded you; and behold, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.”
– Matthew 28:19-20