Archives - SALVATIONIST 1 January 2011
God’s sovereignty – our
fallibility
In the final article in his
series on presenting Jesus to a lost world, Major Howard Webber describes two
fulfilling encounters that so easily could have been missed -
EVEN when we are concerned
about the eternal wellbeing of those without Christ, there is often an
accompanying reticence to do much about it. This is caused, more often than
not, by fear – fear of what the reaction might be to our feeble attempts to
share what is so precious to us; fear of what others might think of us; fear of
failure; fear of not knowing the answers to questions that might come our way.
In the past I’ve been told
that I must overcome my fear; that with practice I would overcome my fear – but
this has not been my experience. I’ve never overcome my fear, or my inherent
reluctance to reach out and engage with a stranger. But, as with all our
feelings, it is not a case of eradicating them; rather we must not allow them
to control our actions and reactions.
‘Lean not on your own
understanding,’ says Proverbs 3:5.
Something can appear futile,
a total disappointment, with common sense telling us to shake the dust from our
feet and move on. Yet for some obscure reason we don’t, and suddenly God himself
disperses the fog, does something wonderful and we sense him saying, as often
he does to me: ‘My thoughts are not your thoughts, Howard, neither are your
ways my ways’ (see Isaiah 55:8).
A grumpy man came to his door
and, when offered a Jesus DVD, said very gruffly: ‘Don’t ’ave a DVD player!’
Thinking he might have been delighted to be given a copy of the only video copy
we possessed, my colleague rummaged in her bag and presented it to him
triumphantly, only to be met with a disgruntled: ‘Don’t ’ave
a video player!’
We, very naturally, felt like
walking away, but I asked: ‘How long have you lived here?’ He gave me a strange
look. ‘Eight years,’ he replied. ‘Is it a good area to live in?’ I inquired.
One question followed another
and with each one he slowly thawed, eventually inviting us into his home. He
never has seen the Jesus film, but he is now a friend. Since that first
unpleasant encounter, this former jockey has given me fuchsia cuttings, taught
me about horseracing and allowed me to pray with him and explain the salvation
message. We could so easily have been controlled by how we felt on the first
encounter – and walked away!
None of the men who signed up
for the first night of the Christianity course in the SA hostel turned up – but
four others I had asked that very night agreed to give it a try and thoroughly
enjoyed it.
The following week I discovered one of them had moved out into a
flat and another said he couldn’t make it. So where were the other two? Then I
saw a friend of theirs by the front door.
‘Alex, have you seen Steve
and James?’ I asked.
‘No, I’m looking for them.
Thought we could go for a walk, it’s so nice.’
‘They can’t,’ I said.
‘They’ll be with me at seven. They’re on a course. Why don’t you join us?’
‘No,’ he replied, ‘I’m going
to get them to come with me.’
I was angry at his
determination to take them away, but tried not to show it as I made my way to
get ready.
Seven o’clock came and went.
I waited. No one came. After 20 minutes – disappointed – I decided to give up and
go home, but Alex popped his head round the door.
‘Have you seen them?’ he
asked.
‘No I haven’t,’ I answered,
trying to smother my feelings towards him. ‘Why don’t you sit down and rest
your legs!’ I suggested.
He did, and I sat opposite him and asked him how he was coping. In
answering me he went on to describe his life and open his heart in an
extraordinary way that would never have happened had anyone else been there. After 90 minutes he allowed me to pray for him, accepted a booklet on Jesus, thanked
me and departed.
salvationist@salvationarmy.org.uk
Howard Webber is a retired Salvation Army Officer (Pastor) and lives in retirement in Bournemouth, UK. He's a regular and much valued contributor to this blog site.
SALVATION ARMY WRITER WINS BOOK OF
THE YEAR AWARD
15 June 2011
MAJOR Howard Webber's Meeting Jesus: Inspiring Stories of
Modern-Day Evangelism has been named Christianity magazine’s Book of the Year.
The book, published by The Salvation Army's UK Territory with the Republic of
Ireland, was a runaway winner, receiving an overwhelming 82 percent of readers'
votes!
The Awards are part of the Christian Resources Together Retreat
at High Leigh in the United Kingdom. Launched in 2010, Christianity magazine's
Book of the Year category celebrates quality, original, Christian-themed
writing that offers something special to readers. Last year’s winner was
Breakout by Mark Stibbe and Andrew Williams, published by Authentic Media.
'Meeting Jesus' is about the author's encounters with ordinary
people, encounters which are made extraordinary by the transforming power of
the gospel. The book is not about overwhelming success - but it is about the
reality of what happens when people meet Jesus and about the kind of change he
can effect when given the space to do his work.
Steve
Morris gave Major Webber's book five stars in his review in Christianity
magazine.
He wrote: 'Fred is high on
drugs and doesn't want Howard, the then Salvation Army captain, to come round
to his flat because it is in chaos, rather like Fred himself. They meet, instead,
in the cafe at a supermarket in a nearby town. But the road isn't straight and
we follow the twists and turns of Howard and Fred's relationship – through
missed promises, desperate heartache and self-destruction and final redemption.
'This book
is perhaps the most extraordinary one I've reviewed since writing for
Christianity. It is a series of stories of evangelism on the hard side of life.
It is painfully honest and lists as many failures as successes, as many deaths
as new lives. It documents Howard Webber's spiritual battles too.
'It is
perhaps the most moving set of accounts I've ever read and the most hopeful. It
is all too easy to see the role of being God's ambassadors as reduced to
preaching, or set among those who we love and are safe. But this book
challenges us to be where Jesus would be, with the down-and-outs, with the
hopeless and the broken. It looks the cost of such ministry square in the eye
and carries on just the same.'
Ruth Dickinson, Editor of Christianity magazine, adds: 'I want to commend Howard Webber for this
great achievement, all the more phenomenal because, as a first time author, he
didn't have the same following as the other more well known writers on the
shortlist. What I loved about Meeting Jesus was the way it documented his
"failures" as an evangelist as well as his success stories. It's very
rare to read something so honest and so inspiring at the same time.'
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