stories from the Question & Answer sessions

Perhaps my favorite development recently has been getting to be involved with the Question & Answer sessions after the Wednesday and Thursday night programs. I have been helping with the Farsi speaking group, but there is also an Arabic group each time as well.  There has usually been about 15 to 20 Farsi speakers that attend the Q & A session, and their questions have been genuine and meaningful.  Here are just a few of the questions that have been asked: 

"What does the name, Jesus Christ, mean?"

"What does it mean that He was called 'the Son of man'?"

"Is it true that He was really the Son of God?" 

"How is it that He was 'the Son of God' and 'the Son of man' at the same time?"

"What did he mean when John said that he was unworthy to untie Jesus' sandals in John 1?"

Those are just a few of the questions that have given us opportunity to share and explain more things about Jesus; what has been really good is that very often the questions revolve around Jesus. The other big topic is, of course, the Trinity, but this too gives us a further chance to explain the nature of God and we do our best to explain this big topic in a simple way.    

And then there have been a few questions from the new believers among them as well, such as, 

"you shared a message about finding peace in Jesus and praying to Him about our problems.  But as a new believer, would God be angry with me for praying to Him about my problems?"  

and then another asked, "last Sunday at church, we had communion. I did not really understand -- can you explain that to me again, what was that all about?" 

And another young man shared quite openly, "back home in my country, they taught Islam, but nobody could really do it. Nobody.  If you coach soccer, you also do it and show the players how. They taught this religion, but they could not do it.  And I remember my father, who died when I was nine, when I did something wrong I would apologize to him, but he would just punish me more.  Here, though, it is so special to hear that I can be a child of God. I like it so much. It is so special to be here." 

Thanks so much for your interest, and please keep on praying for us as a staff and for the many refugees that come through our doors.  -Ken