Zurich Mission Trip - Day 4
Hey Guys!
Day 4 has been a busy day with lots of challenging times and exciting God moments.
After a great breakfast and our normal route to church we started the day with prayer and worship. We were then encouraged to prayer walk around the red light district in Zurich. Walking around I noticed many sex shops and prostitutes hanging around looking for business. It felt very strange being in this environment, it wasn’t my usual Friday morning walk around the beautiful sights of Woodbridge. It was a powerful and challenging experience. This walk wasn’t just a easy way of mission but it was in preparation for the afternoon when we would actually go into some of the brothels and shops to minister to these people. Scary!
After the prayer walk we went to a night club where the owner has recently given his life to Jesus. He shared his story, which was AMAZING! He also shared his vision for the night club. Over the past few years the club use to be a sex shop, a centre for drug use, and a building that is wanted by the big club owners because of it’s location (centre of the red light district). He believes God is calling him to create a safe place where people can come and meet God. He also wants to create a church on a Sunday morning. However, he is worried due to growing interest in the building from other club owners who have more money. He now has three weeks to find the money. PLEASE PRAY FOR THIS!
Lunch was fantastic! After lunch when where given cake and coffee to hand out round the red light district. The next few hours were incredible. I went with a team of half English and half Swiss (they really know how to do mission!). We went into shops and prayed for people. I went into three brothels with some guys from the swiss team. It felt so wrong walking into this place of sexual abuse but I remembered that Jesus would have gone into these places. Many of the prostitutes wanted prayer and we held their hands and prayed for them. Often we would see a customer come and head upstairs: this was SO strange to me and made my heart cry out for these women. It was a massive learning curve for me and I know the other guys experienced similar situations.
If there is anything that I have learnt it is that we NEED and MUST talk to people about JESUS not CHURCH. Church is awesome but people need JESUS. We a called to proclaim the name of Jesus. So why not? Are we proud? Are we worried what people might think? Are we scared that people might push us away?
I hope this blog will encourage you to step out in faith. Jesus gave His life for us so why don’t we give Him some credit and share His love and grace with our friends, strangers, shop owner, prostitutes, bank owners, the whole world.
There are SO many stories that I could share with you but I need to go now!
Thank to all that made this trip possible.
God Bless,
Ben