SOS-San Francisco Outreach Report
God has done many wonderful things over the past 12 years of SOS-San Francisco, but this past outreach was certainly one of the best and most diverse. Youth With a Mission (YWAM) teams joined us from New Zealand, Hawaii, Seattle, Denver, and Northern California. Individuals came from as far away as Minnesota and Texas. Over 600 Christians participated in this year’s outreach, with about 300 involved on a daily basis throughout the week. One of the brothers who joined us was Eric Livingston. Eric was saved last summer in the Berkeley jail. We met him the day he was released during last year’s SOS. He participated in the last half of the outreach and entered the Watsonville Teen Challenge program, which he has almost completed.
Over a hundred of those who participated were part of the King’s Kids, children from 6 to 16 years old who ministered in song and dance. Ten of the children came from an orphanage in Mexico! A dozen were from a San Francisco ghetto church. The faith, innocence and love of these precious children would melt the hardest heart. God opened doors through these children that are normally closed to us. They were able to minister at Pier 39, the third biggest tourist attraction in the U.S. The police allowed them to set up a P.A. without a permit at the Marina Green on July 4, while thousands were waiting to see the fireworks display. One of the King’s Kids groups was a “Hands” team, a group of teenagers that was involved in service projects, such as cleaning up Golden Gate Park and giving out clothes to the poor. Many of the teenagers were involved in a Torch Run, carrying a torch into every area of San Francisco, praying for that area and giving out tracts to people who watched them. Some Russian immigrants were involved in this ministry.
The YWAM team from New Zealand sang local native songs from their country, using them in evangelism. Calvary Chapel of San Francisco led a prayer team to neighborhoods throughout the city. One team worked with Asian teenagers in the Tenderloin district. Another team did some door to door witnessing with a local church in the Glen Park district and witnessed at City College. We had six drama teams in various areas. One brother ministered using sketchboard illustrations. On July 4, we fed and witnessed to hundreds of Hispanics in the Potrero Hill district.
The New Life Christian Church worship group led us in worship throughout the week–both at church and on the streets–that was truly anointed. We received some outstanding teaching in evangelism. On the first Friday and Saturday nights, John Goodfellow taught us effective ways of reaping a harvest. John is a teacher with YWAM who organized a summer evangelism outreach in Amsterdam for many years. Ray Comfort was with us on Tuesday and Wednesday. He taught us how to use God’s law to bring conviction of sin and real conversions. On Friday night, Pastor Michael Brodeur from Vineyard Christian Fellowship–a San Francisco church that has grown to over 500 in six years–spoke about the place of signs and wonders in evangelism.
Sunday was a day off for us, but it was also the day of the annual “Gay Parade” which drew an estimated 200-500 thousand people. Several Christians witnessed at the parade. One brother shared that as he walked by the parade he began to intercede. One of the homosexuals walked up to him, noticing his Christian T shirt, and asked him to pray that he would be delivered from this bondage. Unlike last year, we had no opposition from “gay” or other groups this year.
We had three worship rallies at Union Square and two at Embarcadero. The first rally at Embarcadero was on a very hot day and over a thousand businessmen were in the plaza. We gave out 100 New Testaments that day. On Wednesday, we did our first outreach in seven years at Lower Sproul Plaza on the University of California campus in Berkeley. Afterwards, Ray Comfort preached without an amplifier and drew a crowd of over a hundred people. He gave out free dollar bills to illustrate that salvation is a free gift that we must humble ourselves to receive.
On Saturday, 200 Christians from Set Free Christian Fellowship in Anaheim joined us for a rally at Washington Square. Most of these people had been saved from intense involvement in drugs and gangs. Hundreds of unbelievers were drawn to the rally. Afterwards, we marched from Washington Square to the Powell St. BART station. We carried a hundred banners and sang worship songs as we marched through Chinatown and downtown San Francisco.
That night Set Free Pastor Phil Aguilar spoke about the need to be a doer of God’s Word. We already have too much head knowledge of the Bible, he said. We need to start practicing what we already know–to take on the ministry of inconvenience–to inconvenience ourselves to meet the needs of others. We concluded the outreach Saturday night with prayer for San Francisco on Twin Peaks.
I realize that it is impossible to adequately convey the excitement of participating in the outreach, or the powerful influence it had on many thousands of people. God also did a work in our lives as took on the ministry of inconvenience, sacrificing our time and money to minister to the people of San Francisco. God is faithful to reward us with an eternal treasure. I believe that treasure will be many people added to His kingdom.
A Full House
For two years, we have been praying that God would fill our ministry house with Christians who are dedicated to evangelism. God has answered our prayers by bringing in three new people. Brandon Matz has been witnessing with us for the past four years, and has moved here from Sonoma County after finishing auto repair school. Ralph Silvestri lived in our house several years ago and has been involved in evangelism in Los Angeles and San Francisco for several years. He has a special burden for Hispanics.
Stuart Geller is here on a one year internship while working on a Doctor of Divinity (the first ever in street evangelism!) at Northern Baptist Theological Seminary near Chicago. He has a Master of Divinity from Fuller Seminary and has been involved in street ministry for many years. Recently, he worked with World Relief, developing a church-based ministry to the homeless. He will be working on developing relations with local churches and training Christians in evangelism. If you live in the San Francisco area and would like to see your church get more active in evangelism (and who wouldn’t?), contact Stuart at the SOS office.
One former member of our house, David McLane, went to be with Jesus on June 16. He had been saved out of homosexuality and lived in our discipleship house and later in our evangelism house for several years. AIDS normally involves several years of serious illness and much pain. Through God’s mercy, David was seriously ill for only 10 days. Shortly before he died, he heard God speak to him in an audible voice, “I’m waiting with open arms to receive you.” We had a memorial service for David at our church two days before SOS. Five young people from his workplace attended the service and we were able to witness to them.
Ministry Needs
As the ministry grows, we have a lot of special needs. Our house needs a lot of repairs and we have very little funds. We can use help from people with skills in electricity, plumbing and remodeling to fix up our house.
Last Friday night, we had ten new people for our outreach. Most of them were at SOS, and want to be involved in this ongoing ministry. Please pray for these new people, as well as the new members of our house, that God will strengthen them to continue to witness with us. Satan reserves his strongest attacks for those Christians who threaten his kingdom through prayer and evangelism.
Today I received a call from a youth leader at Peninsula Bible Church in Palo Alto. She wants to bring a vanload of youth to San Francisco to witness with us on a monthly basis on Saturday afternoon. We will be planning a regular outreach with them starting this fall.
Thank you for your continued prayers and financial support for this ministry. It is through your help that we were able to reach many people for Jesus during SOS-San Francisco and train several hundred Christians in evangelism. Please continue to pray for us this next year as we make a special effort to reach out to local churches and equip believers to preach the gospel, both in their everyday lives and through special outreaches.
Our next major worship rally is scheduled for Saturday August 24. The SOS worship group from New Life Christian Church will be ministering. We meet at the Powell St. BART station at 3 PM. God did a great work in San Francisco during SOS, but that work is far from over. We need to continue to reach out to the people of this city throughout the year with the gospel.
I have enclosed an order form to get tapes of the meetings from this year’s outreach. There were some excellent teachings throughout the week, and I’m sure you will be blessed by these tapes. We are working on a videotape of some of the highlights of this year’s outreach and hope to have it ready next month.
Yours in His love,
Larry Rosenbaum