Recap: Marshalltown Octemberfest 2023

And you will seek Me and find Me, when you search for Me with all your heart.

Jeremiah 29:13 NKJV

With the threat of rainstorms and clouds that could potentially drop enough water to make Noah nervous, Lisa and I pressed on and decided to meet Paul in Marshalltown for Octemberfest 2023 on Friday night. My wife said, “If we don’t go and it doesn’t rain, we will be extremely disappointed. If we do go and it rains, we can say at least we tried.”

We stopped at Paul’s place and spent time praying for the outreach, that God would give us the words to speak, and that He would send us to people He wanted us to speak with, that people would be attentive to what we had to say, and receive Christ as Lord and Savior.

We drove over to where the festival was and found the perfect parking spot, right outside the car show and band stage. This year, the setup was completely different: the car show was outside the stage and split between three sections of street; the food trucks were behind the stage, and a large gap between all of that and the carnival rides. All of which were on three sides of Marshalltown Town Square. As the night went on because of this set up, it was dark from the lack of streetlights and loud music from the band playing. Paul lost his perfect spot which would have been under a street light between the car show and food trucks to three Port-a-Potty’s. It was a really crappy situation for the three of us.

Lisa and I scooped-the-loop around the town square and tried to get into one-on-one conversations with several people before it got dark. No one wanted to talk. We passed out several million-dollar-bills, but everyone was on their way somewhere, trying to find friends or family, or completely ignoring us. We were discouraged, and went back to meet Paul and see how he was doing. He wasn’t doing any better, even with his light-up cross, but we sought the Lord and prayed for divine appointments, and boy did we get one.

Chase

As Lisa and I made it around the square I noticed a young man sitting on the bleachers texting on his phone. I took the advice of Tony Ramsek of What Does the Scripture Say, to interrupt people texting on their phones that are not conversating because it is a sign of boredom. It has been proven almost every time, so I interrupted him and gave him a Living Waters million-dollar-bill.

“Hey man,” I said. “My wife and I are out here giving these away to people in hopes to get into a conversation. It’s a million-dollar-bill and has the million-dollar-question on the back.” He smiled and turned it over. He didn’t quite understand the question (will you go to heaven when you die), and seemed to be taken back by the statement, and I could tell he was reading further. “Do you understand the question,” I asked. “Do you have any spiritual beliefs? You look puzzled.”

“I guess I don’t get it. I mean, I know there is a God and a devil, heaven and hell, spiritual things. It’s not that I don’t believe those things exist, but I just, I don’t know — never really thought about it before. Is that weird?”

“So, you never looked at spiritual things like this? So, who is Jesus to you?”

“I don’t know. I guess I never looked into it,” he said with a strange look on his face. “No one has ever come up to me like this. It’s different for sure.” You could tell he was seriously asking and wondering why he never did. “I’ve never been to church, read a Bible, my family is not religious at all, and I never really questioned any of it. I mean, I’ve seen ghosts and spirits and stuff, but so I know something exists in a spiritual realm, but I never thought about where they come from and stuff.” The more he thought about the conversation he landed in, the more attentive, focused, and friendly he became.

I took him through the Good Person Test and he realized that he was a sinner, and destined to hell, but even though he agreed with everything I said, to him — hell wasn’t as real to him as most people. I don’t know; to him it’s possible that it was a type of folklore. At twenty-five years of age, he finds out all of this information for the first time, but really doesn’t know how to process any of it. Even as a Roman Catholic I had some sense of God, Jesus, and eternal things; but to him, he is as new to this as an infant. I shared with him the basics of the faith, who Jesus is, what He did including creating everything in the universe, and that He was sent to save mankind from their sins if they put their faith and trust in Him; not just head knowledge, but living it out. I gave him a Gideon New Testament and showed him the basics of what the gospels are, the epistles, Psalms and Proverbs. To help that along I gave him a booklet called, Seven C’s of History and explained it as a 747’s view of the entire Bible. He gladly took everything I gave him with a smile.

Maybe I overdid it. I said, “I don’t mean to overwhelm you, man. This is a lot to think about, huh? I just don’t know if I will ever see you again since I’m from Ankeny, but I wanted to give you a good start anyway.”

“Yeah, it is, but I’m definitely wanting to know and will take small bites. I honestly didn’t expect anything like this tonight.”

“This is normal for me; it’s something I do, seriously.” I reached out my hand and he shook it. “What’s your name?”

“Chase.”

“…Chase, I think God’s chasing you down.”

He smiled wide and chuckled, “I think so too.”

I gave him my contact card and a GotQuestions.org card in case he had questions and needed answers and wished him a good night. He was, by far, the most engaged, kindest, and friendliest person I’ve ever witnessed to. It was an absolute pleasure, and hope he reaches out to me soon.

End of the evening

After the conversation with Chase, Lisa and I were both on cloud nine, and totally thrilled to have had an amazing conversation. Every time we share our faith, it is successful, no matter what the outcome. We joined up with Paul: who gave out several tracts and had one short conversation with two older ladies (still a win), decided to call it a night since it was very dark and noisy where we were.

The hour-long ride home was filled with the usual what should I have said or done differently. In the conversation with Chase, I really need to perfect how to share the gospel to someone who has absolutely no clue about anything in the Bible, and give a short three-minute presentation. Seriously, how do you share over 6,000 years of biblical history in six minutes? My wife said I came close to sharing too much information, but the look on his face and asking questions was saying otherwise. I am comfortable with that.

Why do we always think that our conversations with the lost will be difficult and painful? Why don’t we ever think that we could be the answer to their prayer, or the prayers of saints dear to them? There are countless people out there, like Chase, who genuinely want to know, and we have the answers they are looking for. I encourage you to step out of your comfort zone and share the gospel to a stranger. You’ll be glad you did.

P.S. It never rained the entire night!

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