Bay Area Outreach Ministries Newsletter
Ministry News Update
Dear Christian friends,
It is good to be writing the SOS Newsletter once again after a three year absence. Many of you have also been receiving the Bay Area Outreach Ministries Newsletter, and know what we have been doing. In this newsletter, I’d like first to update the rest of you on the past three years, and then to share about the evangelism outreaches we will be doing and our vision for the future of SOS Ministries. This will be an unusually long newsletter since I have so much catching up to do, but I think you will find it worth reading.
In 1975, God called me to preach the gospel in San Francisco. When I first arrived, I witnessed mostly by myself, but over the next few years, God brought together several leaders of churches and ministries which desired to evangelize this very needy city. From this union, SOS Ministries was established as an outreach ministry to San Francisco, conducting ongoing outreaches in San Francisco every week, special outreaches, and an annual SOS-San Francisco outreach, which has just completed its tenth year. I served as director of SOS Ministries for eight years, before giving leadership of this ministry to Ron Woodruff and starting a new ministry.
Bay Area Outreach Ministries was established three years ago to expand the ministry in San Francisco to Berkeley and the rest of the Greater S F Bay Area. God has blessed this ministry tremendously with a house for ministry workers in Oakland, an ongoing outreach in Berkeley, and special outreaches in other cities. This past spring, Ron Woodruff and the brethren who work with him in San Francisco felt that God was moving them into a new direction–namely, to get a boat and use it as a means to do outreaches in coastal U.S. cities and around the world.
After much prayer and discussion as to how the ministry in San Francisco could continue, I have agreed to take over as Director of SOS Ministries, and to merge it with Bay Area Outreach Ministries. Meanwhile, Ron and the brethren at the Sycamore St. house in San Francisco will be beginning a new ministry, called Land and Sea.
Bay Area Outreach Ministries
Three years ago, I moved from the SOS Ministries house in San Francisco to Oakland to start a Christian ministry house on Dakota St., in a house that was donated to the ministry. The burden God had placed on my heart was to see the evangelistic ministry God had raised up in San Francisco be expanded to other cities in the Greater S F Bay Area.
We began calling churches throughout the area asking them if we could help them start an outreach in their own community. We did receive positive response from some churches and began to do outreaches in San Jose, Santa Cruz, Richmond, Fresno, Mendocino and Lakeport with local churches in these areas. We also witnessed at special events such as the Half Moon Bay Pumpkin Festival and the Castro Valley Fair and did special outreaches in cities such as Stockton and Sausalito.
Our main focus of outreach, however, has been Berkeley. Like San Francisco, Berkeley is a trendsetter with great influence worldwide. The University of California is one of the world’s great universities and trains many of the future leaders of this and other nations. Telegraph Avenue is one of the busiest streets anywhere, with thousands of students and others on the street day and night. For the past three years, we have been witnessing on that street two to three times a week, on Wednesday afternoon, Friday night and Saturday afternoon.
We have been getting loudspeaker permits to preach and worship on the street. Usually, a heckler known as “the Hate Man” or “Java” tries to interrupt our preaching. This in turn often draws a large crowd of students who stand around for hours listening. Sometimes we are able to have question and answer sessions with the students. Often, Christian students will use the opportunity to witness to the people gathered one-on-one while we are preaching. The controversy surrounding our preaching removes a lot of the apathy that normally affects the students and causes them at least to be willing to talk about Jesus. A number of people who have been saved off the street are now in local churches, especially a new church in Berkeley called Neighborhood Church.
On September 14-16, we planned a major outreach in Berkeley, called Battle for Berkeley, in cooperation with New Horizons Christian Ministries and several churches. Over a hundred Christians from all over the West Coast participated in this outreach. We set up a PA system right at the entrance to the University campus for four hours each afternoon! Every day large crowds gathered to listen to the powerful worship and preaching. There were also mockers who tried to disrupt the meetings, but they were unable to stop the ministry of the Holy Spirit. During the evenings, Telegraph Avenue was filled with Christians worshipping and witnessing. On the final day, we had a very unusual September rain and thought we would have to cancel our worship rally. We had brought a tarp to protect the equipment but miraculously, one of the brothers had tent poles in his car and we were able to protect the worship group so they could play for four hours in the rain! In the twelve years I have been doing these kinds of outreaches, this was the first time we had been able to play outside in the rain.
Some of our opponents in Berkeley had thought they would be able to drive us out of the city. But God was faithful to bring in reinforcements and we saw a great victory for our Lord as the enemy was pushed back and the Word of God went forth with great power.
Legal Problems
Twenty five years ago, Berkeley was known as the center of the “Free Speech Movement.” The area where Telegraph Ave. meets the campus is traditionally the location for major rallies of all kinds. According to the S F Chronicle, “Candidates as diverse as Richard Nixon and Adlai Stevenson pulled their campaign caravans up to the corner of Telegraph Avenue and Bancroft Way. They spoke to students over public address systems that carried across the south campus area.”
However, the tolerance of Berkeley residents to all sorts of diverse ideas and behavior apparently does not extend to the gospel. A number of local residents complained to the police, attempting to stop our preaching. The Berkeley City Manager wrote a letter to the Police Department asking them to deal with the situation. The police began first to question our permits, then to write citations, and finally on three occasions to imprison me (twice) and another person (once). The latest incident occurred on August 25, when four of us were arrested for allegedly disturbing the peace. I was imprisoned and the other three were cited and released. The matter was not a great concern to us, since we knew it would not hold up in court. However, the police also knew the charge would not stand, so they changed it to battery against a police officer, claiming two of us pushed an officer. Although we have five witnesses and other evidence to support us, it is still possible we could be found guilty, if the jury decides to believe the police officer instead of us. This would make it very difficult for us to continue our outreach in Berkeley as at any time the police could again accuse us of pushing them and we could be imprisoned for increasing amounts of time. We do not believe that God wants this to happen, and ask that you pray fervently (and perhaps fast also) for a not guilty verdict in this case. The trial is scheduled for December 4-8.
Publicity
All these problems have resulted in some publicity in the student newspaper, the Daily Californian. Almost all of the 30,000 students read this paper and now know about us. As a result, many are stopping to listen to what we have to say. Here are some excerpts from a September 21 article:
Berkeley prides itself on being a city that values free speech. But a group of residents, merchants and homeless people in Berkeley are teaming up to try to silence a fundamentalist Christian group that preaches on various corners of Telegraph Avenue.
The group working against the preachers is led by an elderly Southside resident named John Region. “Those people get out there screaming and yelling…this goes on every Friday night,” Region said.
The leader of the ministry group, Larry Rosenbaum, denied that they are disturbing the peace and defended his group’s presence in Berkeley. “We believe God wants us to be out there, and the Bible says that Jesus gave us commission…to preach the gospel. We believe God has called us specifically to evangelism in Berkeley,” Rosenbaum said.
But Region, 64, says the preaching outside his apartment aggravates his congested lungs, and that he has a letter from his doctor to prove it. “I hate that stuff so bad. When they get carrying on and preaching, I start hyperventilating…it’s put me in the hospital several times,” Region said.
Region said he has dumped water on the preachers, blasted them with loud “Satanic music,” and applied for a permit to use amplified sound there…to prevent the ministry from legally preaching there.
Rosenbaum’s lawyer, Julia Spain, said the Berkeley police and hecklers are violating her client’s freedom of speech. “Berkeley wants to hold itself as the last bastion of free speech,” she said, “But it’s only free if (Berkeley locals) like it.”
Several vendors on Telegraph Avenue and some homeless people are also angry about the ministers. “We consider those Christians to be a public nuisance,” said Anna Field, a vendor and self-described pagan.
Berkeley Police Capt. Bobby Miller defended the department’s handling of the situation. “If the only way to move the crowd is to stop the preaching, then yes, we would stop the preaching,” Miller said.
SOS Ministries–Purpose and Vision
From the beginning, the purpose of SOS Ministries has been to mobilize Christians from all over the U.S., and particularly from the S F Bay Area, to bring the gospel to the people of San Francisco. We are a street evangelism ministry, which means we go to the public places–streets, parks, special events–to witness for Jesus Christ. We use a wide variety of methods: preaching, tract distribution, “church on the street” worship rallies, signs, banners, and crosses, street drama, marches, public baptisms, and of course a lot of one-on-one sharing. Over the past ten years, SOS Ministries has had a tremendous impact upon the people of San Francisco. Several million tracts have been given out to San Francisco residents and people from all over the world. Hundreds of thousands of people have witnessed large worship rallies in public places, heard our preaching, and been exposed to the gospel through one-on-one witness. We often receive calls and visits from people who tell us they were saved through this ministry.
At the same time, I believe that the ministry we have seen in San Francisco needs to be extended to other places, both in the S F Bay Area and around the world. In 1986, I wrote a book You Shall Be My Witnesses: How to Reach Your City for Christ. Several thousand copies have been sold and given out and have been used to start and help dozens of evangelism ministries around the country. I also became the administrative director of the International Street and Evangelism Ministries Association (ISEMA), a network of evangelism ministries. ISEMA now operates out of our house on Dakota Street and provides a means by which street ministries can communicate with one another.
While we are beginning new outreaches in San Francisco, we also will continue our outreaches in Berkeley and will do occasional outreaches in other cities in the Bay Area. We especially want to help Bay Area churches receive training in evangelism and start outreach teams.
We will continue to organize the SOS-San Francisco outreach, which will become SOS-San Francisco/Berkeley, with several days of outreach in Berkeley. Our Friday night and Saturday afternoon outreaches will alternate between San Francisco and Berkeley, leaving room for special outreaches in other cities.
The Controversy over Evangelism Methods
The “high visibility” evangelism methods we use have definitely generated some criticism in the Christian world. Some Christians maintain that we should only engage in low-key one-on-one sharing, friendship evangelism, and mercy ministry instead of preaching. They say we are offending people with our amplified preaching and causing problems with the police.
We do believe in and are involved in a lot of one-on-one sharing and friendship evangelism. We have been involved in giving out food and blankets to the homeless, and often are involved in helping with individual needs. We also are involved in discipling new converts and helping them get involved in local churches. However, we maintain that the Bible needs to be our textbook for evangelism, and the Bible clearly teaches that we are called to proclaim the gospel openly in the public places.
The Old Testament prophets, our Lord, and the early apostles were all what we would today call street preachers. They proclaimed God’s word boldly without compromise in the streets and public places. While some repented, many others rejected the gospel, persecuted them, casting them into prison and putting many of them to death. Jesus promised that the same would happen to us. Paul said, “All who will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution” (2 Tim. 3:12). We love to claim the promises of God, but rarely claim this promise.
The opposition, the arrests, the crowds that often surround us with some mocking and others listening, all remind me of the book of Acts. In the ten years we have witnessed in San Francisco none of us were ever arrested or needed to go to court. But Berkeley is different, and times are changing. I would encourage you to read two best-selling books by Frank Peretti, This Present Darkness and Piercing the Darkness. Although they are fiction, they are remarkably similar to the situation we are encountering in Berkeley. Also, they remind us of the spiritual battle that is behind what we see in the natural, and the great need for true intercession in order to gain victory.
Outreach Schedule
Friday Night
First and Third Week of Month–Berkeley
Second, Fourth, and Fifth Week of Month–San Francisco
Saturday Afternoon
First Week of Month–Berkeley Worship Rally — 1-5 PM, Telegraph and Bancroft St.
Third Week of Month–San Francisco Worship Rally — 3-6 PM, Hallidie Plaza, Market and Powell St.
Other Saturdays will be reserved for special outreaches.
SOS Christmas Outreach — Saturday December 16, 3-6 PM
Market and Powell St., San Francisco
Our first major outreach will be on Saturday December 16 from 3-6 PM. It will feature Tim Charles and the wonderful worship group from this year’s SOS-San Francisco outreach. I certainly hope you can come join us for this special Christmas outreach. This is normally the busiest day of the year for Christmas shopping and hundreds of thousands of people will be here, at a time when people tend to be most open to the gospel.
Some Thoughts on the Earthquake
Once again, the attention of the world was focused on the San Francisco Bay Area as the “Bay Bridge” World Series was suddenly interrupted by a major earthquake on October 17. The day after the earthquake, I was watching Pat Robertson on the 700 Club. He made some interesting comments about the situation. First, that judgment must begin in the house of God, as it has. Second, he shared from Leviticus 18 five reasons why the land of Canaan literally “vomited out her inhabitants”: incest (25% of all US children believed victims of incest), adultery, offering their children to Moloch (abortion), homosexuality, and bestiality (is that next?).
Even in this judgment great mercy was shown–relatively few deaths, amazingly only one death from the Bay Bridge collapse at rush hour! Still, the hearts of most people remain hard–perhaps only a great economic collapse or greater destruction would bring many to repentance. The 1906 earthquake came only 9 days after the Azusa Street revival in Los Angeles. Perhaps it was in response to prayers for revival in San Francisco. Despite the great destruction, a great many people were saved from eternal destruction. We do not pray for judgment, but rather that God will have mercy on the people of the S F area. Yet, in His wisdom, He may use these kinds of judgment to bring about the salvation of many.
Ministry Needs
As we begin taking over the work of SOS Ministries, we have many needs. Here are a few that I can think of right now: we need a PA system for outdoor outreaches, a printing press, a generator, and a van to transport people and equipment. We need to print some new tracts and make some new signs and banners. We need Christians to join us for our weekly outreaches. We also need several people to move into our ministry house and help us with evangelism and other ministry work. Call or write me right away if you are interested.
We have set up a special legal fund to help with the costs of defending ourselves in court. We have filed a lawsuit against the city of Berkeley and the University for depriving us of our constitutional rights, in an effort to stop the arrests. Our lawyer, who is a Christian, is not charging us for her services, which is a tremendous sacrifice to her of hundreds of hours. Please pray for her, and for other lawyers, paralegal workers, and a court reporter to donate time to help in this case. Also our legal expenses will total about $10,000. This is a very small amount considering the issues that are at stake, which could greatly affect our freedom to preach the gospel in this nation. Christians spend millions of dollars on church buildings, television and radio time, and many other everyday expenses. An evangelist will spend $10,000 to rent a building for a single crusade. The streets are free–but only if we pay the price to keep them free. If you want to help with this need, put “legal fund” on you check or on the enclosed response card.
At the same time, we ask that you will consider helping us with our ongoing expenses. We do not believe in begging for money, and trust our Lord to speak to those who believe in this ministry, in the evangelizing of San Francisco and the Bay Area, to support this ministry. There are a great many expenses in operating this ministry, and we do the best we can on our shoestring budget. For example, I am supposed to receive a stipend of $400 per month, but have not been paid since June. We hope that some of you will make a commitment to support us on a monthly basis.
This month I am offering a copy of my book You Shall Be My Witnesses: How to Reach Your City for Christ, free to all who request it. Some of the items discussed in this 140 page book: starting a street witnessing team, getting your church involved in evangelism, witnessing to homosexuals, witnessing at shopping centers, rock concerts, and schools, and a history of SOS Ministries. God bless you all. Please do pray for us, and especially for the court case. I hope you can join us for the December 13 outreach.
Yours in His love,
Larry Rosenbaum