Be sure to join us tomorrow, Sunday February 8, on 1:1 Radio with our guests Scott and Patte Smith from Sanctuary Ministries. The Smith’s have a God honoring ministry that is largely involved with sharing the Gospel outside of abortion mills here in the United States. Even if you are pro murder we welcome you to call in to the show during its live broadcast. The show starts at 4:00 pm Eastern time and goes until about 5:30. If you can’t listen live you can download the show via podcast.
Well, the last two weeks have been quite busy. There is as always just too much to report on! But it is my pleasure to at least briefly outline some of the highlights. The University of New Mexico and New Mexico State University were the campuses where I preached last week. I spent two days at each campus. U of NM had quite a large crowd and the students were so upset about evilution being a lie. It is a great segue into the spiritual things of God. I have yet to visit any campus where the students or professors can give me any empirical evidence for macro evilution. The fallback statements are that science proves it, fossils prove it, we evolved from apes, etc. But it always seems to come back to the students demanding that I have to prove a Creator. I gladly do, but just because I have proved a Creator does not mean that the students want to accept logical, rational thinking. One student I met said that he came to the university believing in young earth but after having been there for two years, he now is very confused. He said all the teachers and professors teach evilution as proven truth, fact, and that any other belief is just ignorant. It was great. I got an opportunity to prove the Creator of the universe and segue into the Gospel. My voice held out too! I preached for nearly five hours. The police were present as usual keeping the presence of law enforcement very visible. Many times while traveling to campuses, false claims are made of remarks that I have made. Of course the accusations never hold any merit. The police usually ask me for my identification and do a background check on me and then I get to go back to work. The weather was warm and sunny the first day at U of NM and I had to wear spf 45 sunblock, which is a daily ritual. I also wore glasses because much of the day I was looking into the sun. I like it when the students can see my eyes, but it is the only set I have so if it is really sunny I try to protect them.
Here are some photos that a local photographer/student named Ryan Haack took of me while I preached at NMSU:
The gentleman wanted me to know the finer points of using the f-bomb
The crowd grew to at least twice this size at one point
Mouse view
Sharing Good News
I received an e.mail on my phone from a woman who works at the campus while I was traveling back to the RV to meet up with my family. She heard the preaching and stood by to listen. It turns out she is a Christian and her husband is a pastor. They asked Lisa, Eliza, William, and me over for dinner that evening. We accepted the offer and had a great time at their home in fellowship. Here is a picture from that evening:
Kourtney Zahn on the right and his wife Faith
After two days at U of NM, I went to New Mexico State University. The weather was great both days. We had a very large meeting the first day and a more civil and smaller meeting the second day. I got permission from the administration prior to preaching both days, so when the police came and said that I could not be there I had to explain that the admin. said that it was an open campus and free speech was allowed anywhere. It worked out great. At one point a student on the first day stole my bible right out of my hands while I was reading Scripture. I almost wept as he stole my “sword”. I LOVE MY BIBLE. He ran off with it and five minutes later three students came back with it. Unfortunately, the students had used force to get it back. The police came back again and said that some students stated that I had told the men to beat the thief up! Crazy stuff. I can’t believe some of the accusations that are sometimes made. The police then asked if I wanted to press charges… of course I did not want to press charges. I got the bible back, and then this week I got an e.mail from the student himself asking for forgiveness. That was a blessing!
Here is a link to a front page report in the university paper of the Bible stealing incident:
And here is a brief video that I took while preaching:
Many times from these campuses I have students e.mail me support and praise. More recently, I’ve had a student who is an atheist dialoguing with me via e.mail on abortion issues, God’s plan of salvation, homosexuality, inerrency of the Bible, etc. It was very encouraging after having preached the first day at NM State, I had at least six students walk up to me and thanked me for being on their campus and preaching God’s Word. Then three of them emailed me as well. I won’t paste their comments here, but I can tell you how encouraging it is to see that there are Christians that understand the urgency of telling people the TRUTH.
Here is a photo of three individuals who came to me with encouragement after I preached the second day at NMSU:
New Mexico State University-The men on the outside are students that thanked me. The woman in the middle is a delivery person on campus and stopped to thank me also .
This week was a bit tougher in terms of being able to preach on campuses. We also had problems with the RV which took two days out of our schedule. I now have a wire tool that electricians use. I have all kinds of tools that I never knew which end to hold. William and I are becoming accomplished mechanics!
The University of Texas, Austin has a policy that does not allow free speech, so we preached to the students that cross the streets coming and going to class. We had lots of great discussions so as it turned out, we didn’t have to preach to be heard. I met up with brothers Jake Gardner and Sean Morris who we had met in NYC last summer. They live here in Texas. They are in their early twenties and they absolutely love Jesus. It has been a blessing meeting up with these guys to preach for the last few days.
Yesterday we ended up at University of North Texas. and another one of Sean and Jake’s friends, Mike, came to preach also. Vincent was there to whom we met while in Arizona. Vincent is the preacher from South Africa who travels with Jeff and Pearl Rose at www.jcryministries.com. It was a great day. The meetings weren’t that large but the students had tons of questions. Here are a couple of photos of the day:
Mike does a bit of churching to the unchurched
Jake and Vincent defend the faith
Shawn Holes preaching to a small group at Univ. of N. Texas
Young William debating with students about evilution. Here he is using the Answers book from Answers in Genesis
Eliza met one of the students named Gabrielle who is a Christian and they became immediate friends.
One more brief update… last night some young men we met at UNT along with Vincent, Jake and I went downtown Dallas to the club district. The women hardly have clothes on and are foul mouthed and the men are extremely drunk. I got back at 3:20 (my head feels like it is in a vice). But we got to preach and seeds were sown. Many people took our Gospel tracts and many heard the Gospel. Some people we just gave tracts to and asked if they would read it when they’d sober up in the morning. It was a beautiful night because the Word of God went forth. We did see one man who seemed be overcome with conviction. We will be praying for him.
One of the questions that we are asked is how do we follow up with sharing the Good News on campuses or on the streets. One way is for us to hand out tracts and at the bottom of the tract is our website, another is for business cards to be distributed with all contact info including web, phone, e.mail, etc.. Truly though, most people suppress the truth in unrighteousness, Romans 1:18, and just don’t want to be saved so giving them any means to follow up is just a way of being hopeful. However, the most recent and catchiest way for follow up is for me to introduce myself to the students and people we meet as “Shawn the Baptist”. It started several months ago from our good friend Bible Greg, an open air preacher, coining that name for me and then it kinda stuck. The students like it and refer to me as Shawn the Baptist – its a play on words and easy to remember. It is now “dot-com’d” both with the correct way of spelling “Shawn” and the incorrect way “Sean” :) . The link directs people to the salvationjunction site where there all all kinds of resources that can assist them on their way.
Thank you for taking the time to read these updates. As always, I want to express our thanks for your financial contributions and prayers. We cannot do this ministry without you. If you are reading this update and you have doubts about your salvation and whether or not you are born again, then please call or e.mail. Our God is mighty to save.
For His glory,
Shawn and Family
Filed under: Evangelism
sounds great man!
I just want to thank you! My daughter goes to the University of Wyoming. Shawn Holmes was there. My daughter who has been saved for many years listened to what he had to say and he put a fire in her. She didn’t realize that alot of people call themselves Christians but are as in the dark as the nonsaved. Churches now are preaching happy, joy, peace, and all your finances will be taken care of by God. They don’t preach the real God! people want God to fit in their lives instead of us changing to fit into Gods. This program has been an eye opener for my daughter. She is heart broken over the reality of our world! Thank you and God bless you! Keep up the good work.