Coming Events
(Outreaches subject to change. Call (510) 282-5629 a few hours before the outreach to confirm)
Friday April 12, 19, 26 5 – 8 PM Witnessing in San Francisco neighborhoods.
Sat. April 13 5th St. and Market SF 12-4 PM.
Sat. April 20 Berkeley outreach 12 – 4 PM Shattuck and Center St.
Sat. April 27 Union Square (Powell and Geary St.) SF 12-3 PM.
How SOS Ministries Got Started – Part II
Dear Christian friends,
After several years of organizing weekend outreaches in the late 1970’s, which involved 100 to 200 Christians every six weeks, twenty leaders who had been involved in planning these outreaches met together in January, 1980. At that meeting, we decided to plan a major, weeklong outreach for August, which we called SOS-San Francisco. People are constantly asking us, “What does SOS stand for?” An SOS is a distress signal, a call for help. We wanted to send out an “SOS” to Christians all over the United States to come to San Francisco to witness for the Lord. People have suggested various meanings for the letters, but the only one I like is “Serve our Savior.”
We printed up thousands of posters and other literature inviting Christians to the outreach. Our mailing list grew to 5000 and we sent newsletters out all over the country. We set up booths and gave out fliers at every Christian event we could find. We shared about the outreach at churches and on Christian radio stations.
In July, David Wilkerson, founder of Teen Challenge ministry and now director of World Challenge, brought a team of thirty workers to San Francisco. They gave out 200,000 copies of a booklet David wrote called “Two of Me: the Struggle with Sin.” They also established a Christian coffeehouse in the heart of the Tenderloin district, the skid-row area of San Francisco. This coffeehouse continued as an effective ministry for four years. About 1500 Christians were involved in the first SOS-San Francisco outreach. Every day and night we sent teams of Christians throughout the city to witness for the Lord. We printed up and gave out about half a million tracts written specially for San Francisco. We put up hundreds of SOS posters around the city. Every afternoon we had an evangelistic concert in a downtown park. Everywhere people went that week in San Francisco, they would run into Christians who would witness to them about Jesus.
Looking back, I still marvel at the way God used some very ordinary Christians to establish a powerful street ministry in San Francisco. When God called me to San Francisco, I never expected to do anything but witness on the street with a few other Christians. I knew nothing about establishing a ministry, setting up a non-profit corporation, putting out newsletters, or coordinating an evangelism outreach involving hundreds of Christians. But after five years of witnessing on the streets, getting little response either from unbelievers or Christians, I became the leader of a ministry that was having a significant impact for Christ on one of the wickedest cities in the world.
We planned a second SOS-San Francisco for 1981. During this year, opposition to us by the homosexual community became very intense. A city-funded organization called Community United Against Violence spearheaded a campaign against us in the homosexual press. Every week an article appeared which described us in the worst possible terms. “They harass local citizens . . . They condemn minorities . . . They cause violence . . . They cry out for our extermination,” said one flier. We became the targets of homosexual hostility towards Anita Bryant and Jerry Falwell, even though we carefully avoided any political statements.
In 1980, our ministry received a lot of criticism from San Francisco churches. In 1981, God showed us to reach out to these churches and serve them. That year, we were able to work with twenty local churches and established an excellent relationship with them. We really needed that support from local churches when we met such great opposition from the militant homosexuals. We also put together a slide show about our ministry and showed it to about ten thousand Christians at 50 churches and several large Christian gatherings. At the end of 1981, a Christian brother donated part of the down payment on a San Francisco house, allowing us to buy a house that became the headquarters of our ministry.
In 1984, the Democratic Convention came to San Francisco and we planned our summer outreach to coincide with the convention. Thirty churches and ministries joined with us in the outreach and we planned two large Christian rallies in front of the Moscone Center, where the convention was held. Many protest groups had converged on the city that week and were planning large protest rallies. Thousands of media people were here from all over the world. City officials worried about riots and bloodshed. On Thursday, Jerry Falwell spoke at a meeting in San Francisco. A massive demonstration against him resulted in violence and several arrests. On Sunday, there were two marches by labor unions and gay rights advocates, each with over 100,000 participants. Monday featured a massive anti-war rally with about 60,000 demonstrators outside the Moscone Center. Among them were tens of thousands of punk rockers and “skinheads” who had come here for the convention. Several dozen of them were arrested. Tuesday afternoon featured a pro-marijuana rally at the Moscone Center.
At the same time, a thousand Christians gathered at Union Square and marched through downtown San Francisco to the Moscone Center for a worship rally with Chuck Girard. Many of the punk rockers at the marijuana rally stayed for our rally, and we witnessed to them. As we worshiped the Lord for several hours, the spiritual atmosphere in the rally area changed.
The next day we held another worship rally at the Moscone Center with evangelist Mario Murillo. Again, the presence of the Holy Spirit in the area was strong. After our rally, a “Peace in El Salvador rally” was planned featuring Martin Luther King`s widow. We stayed to witness. Their rally only drew about 200 people. The Christian presence was so strong in the area–with hundreds of Christians preaching, carrying signs, and witnessing–that people would arrive in the area, see all the Christians, and leave, thinking it was a Christian rally! The next day, the National Organization of Women, one of the most influential groups in the country with over 250,000 members, had planned a rally on the day the first woman was nominated as Vice-President. We sent all our workers there to pray, worship, and witness. Again, their demonstration fizzled with at most 300 demonstrators — all of whom heard about Jesus. During the week, we witnessed to many of the delegates, including Gary Hart and George McGovern.
(to be continued)
On the Streets
On Fri. Dec. 14, we witnessed at Powell and Market. The area was filled with Christmas shoppers. Dave witnessed to Janelle. She said some Christians had witnessed to her 10 years ago and she started reading the Bible. That was the only time she had peace. Since then, she has been miserable and knew she wasn’t living right with God. Dave encouraged her to get right with God and make a change in her life as we enter a new year. She agreed with everything he said.
Dave also witnessed to three Muslim teens, Mateen (whose parents are from Turkey) and Tim and Basheer (both from Yemen). Mateen had talked to Christians and understood the gospel. All of them asked sincere questions and were receptive. Cal witnessed to Ian, who knew about Christianity but had not really heard the gospel. As Cal explained salvation to him, he was really interested. Kathy witnessed to Rachel, who works as a security guard at Gap. She is Jewish, but took a gospel of John.
Ministry Needs
Thank you again for your prayers and financial support for this ministry.
Please continue to pray about the permit situation at the San Francisco Park Department. The good news is that they are temporarily willing to allow us to get two permits a year at Dolores Park for two hours each. This is a 2/3 reduction in our hours, but is a move in the right direction. At the same time, they still insist on greatly increasing our permit fees. The permits we have applied for in 2019, which would have cost $1600 at last year’s prices, would now cost over $45,000! That is clearly unaffordable for our small ministry and clearly unconstitutional.
“Whoever watches the wind will not plant; whoever looks at the clouds will not reap.” (Eccl. 11.4) San Francisco has some of the best weather in the world. We have a very short rainy season (from about December to March) and the rest of the year is dry. Often in the winter, the weather report predicts rain and sometimes strong winds for our weekend outreaches. We don’t allow these forecasts to keep us from preaching the gospel. More often than not, there is little or no rain during our outreach time. Frequently, it will rain as we are driving to the outreach, the rain will stop during our outreach, and it will start again as we are driving home.
I hope many of you will join us for an outreach this next month.
Yours in His love,
Larry Rosenbaum