There's a party in Heaven today!!!!

I'm on a roll! Usually I go a few weeks between updates, but this is my second update in the past 12 hours! This is just some news that can't wait:

One of my Chinese friends came to faith today! :)

About a week and a half ago, she told me that she was interested in the Bi-le and that a mutual friend of ours had taught her some truths from it, but that she still had a lot of questions. I invited her to join us for our Easter service last week, and her English is good, but she had a hard time understanding the speakers' accents and some of the old-fashioned words in the hymns. Still, she enjoyed it and came back for more this week! After the service and our weekly lunch, a group of us went to a cafe nearby to talk some more. (The cafe was a nice surprise! I'd walked past it a few times, but I had never stopped to check it out. It doesn't look like much from the outside, but after you walk in the door and go up a flight of stairs, you're suddenly in a cozy little cafe that doubles as a Chri--ian book store. I'll definitely be back.) It was a group of six of us: a Korean girl, a Hungarian guy, a Chinese girl who believes, me, my friend, and a Chinese guy who was also looking for some answers. Everyone else in the group spoke Chinese pretty well, so most of the conversation was in Chinese. I didn't always understand all of the conversation, but I could pick out some key words, and they stopped every once in a while to translate and ask my opinion. For some reason, the Chinese guy was under the impression that I had the best understanding of the Word because I'm American (what?! ok...), so there were a few times where he would open it up to a verse, show it to me, and ask me what it meant. I don't usually like to be put on the spot like that, and there were a few times where I looked at the verse and just couldn't think of anything good to say, or the verse just didn't seem relevant, but we have a faithful Father, and He gave me the words. (There were times when I was a little surprised impressed at what was coming out of my mouth... they were 100% His words, not mine!) Some of the questions he asked were pretty hard. At one point, he opened it to Matt. 5:31-32, where Je-us forbids divorce except for in cases of unfaithfulness and declares that marrying a divorced woman is adultery. He said, "There are many Chri--ians in America, and they are supposed to follow G-d's law. So why are there so many divorced Chri--ians in America?" (hmmm... what do you even say to that?) I explained to him that we have a problem with nominal "Chri--iannity" in America, and that adultery is a sin, just like any other sin, and that although Chri--ians try to obey G-d's law, we still struggle with sin, and we won't be perfect until the Father returns to make all things right. (Again, I can't take credit for that. That would be plagiarism... or something like that.) After about 2 hours of talking, reading verses, and translating everything back and forth, the four others left, but my friend (we'll call her Jill) still had some questions, so we stayed to talk some more. Her English isn't perfect, but we were able to communicate pretty well. (Plus, she had a handy-dandy little translator that came in handy when we came across a word that I couldn't say in Chinese and she couldn't understand in English.) She had a lot of questions about sin, Judas, the Trinity, eternity, etc. The H. Spirit was definitely with me, showing me were to take her in the Bi-le to show her the answers to her questions. (The other Chinese girl had left her Chinese-English Bi-le there for us, and that came in really handy--I could look up a verse and have "Jill" read it in Chinese.) A lot of the verses I took her to were verses that I'd learned in song-form as a kid. Just goes to show that those "silly" little songs we learn in Sunday School are really important!
She eventually told me that she really admired Je-us and wanted to be like him, but so far, she had been trying to do it in her own strength. And she had pr-yed to G-d before to tell him she was happy, to ask him to protect her family, or to ask for his help with something, but now she was ready to face her sin and to ask for His forgiveness and His help to become more like Chr-st. So I told her to tell Je-us exactly what she had just told me, and we pr-yed together right there! Then I hugged her and told her that the Bible says that they have a party in Heaven every time there's a new "sheep". :) It was so exciting to see er genuinely understand the Go-pel for the first time! We sat and talked for a little while after that, about how Chri--ians aren't perfect, but that the H. Spirit comes to live in us and to help us become more Chri-tlike, and how the Go-pel and our inability to be perfect in our own strength frees us from the pressure of having to be perfectionists, not only morally, but also in our school work, etc. (Chinese students tend to put themselves under a tremendous amount of pressure.) NOT that we shouldn't strive for perfection, but that we should do our best to the glory of G-d, and that He loves us and forgives us even when we fail. From the things that she said, I'm confident that she really does understand the Go-pel. It's such a blessing to be the one G-d used for His will in her life! I feel unworthy. And the conversation was a blessing to me as well. Not only did I get to see the Kingdom get a little bit bigger, but I also was reminded again of G-d's incredible love for us, and the endless grace He as for us.

As we always said in Philly...

"Glory!" :)