He Said WHAT???????

This morning started out like any other morning. I got up, got some caffeine and groggily opened my facebook home page, clicked "Most Recent" and I read this:

"The city's first Pagan Pride Day will be held Saturday. In conjunction with the autumn equinox, the day will see a public religious ceremony celebrating the First Harvest. There will also be workshops -- "Paganism 101," "Ritual tools and symbolism" and "Sacred chanting and drumming," to name a few -- held during the free event that will take place at City Park from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m .

This "friend" (probably picked him up through the game I play on facebook) lives in Kingston, Ontario and lists his religious views as Pagan/Druid. Well, I went to the Kingston, Ontario Department of Tourism's website and guess what? No festival listed...of course if I were Kingston I wouldn't want anyone to know about it. Then I realized something. The autumnal equinox this year is not until September 23, 2010 at 11:09 pm EDT.

Well I got on the comments section of this announcement and asked why it was not on the events calendar on the Kingston website and why a pagan didn't know the autumnal equinox was in September. So far, no response.

Now I can hear some of you asking, "You did unfriend him, didn't you?" No, I didn't. If I unfriend him, who will there be to stand up and offer him the love of Christ? I saw a very brave young Christian trying to witness to an evolutionist without knowing much about evolution. I jumped in to help with the evolution part (I used to be an evolutionist, then a theistic evolutionist and then I dumped all but the parts that are true like survival of the fittest and natural selection.) I was proud that this young man had the spiritual conviction to attempt to witness to him. Most of us would have just ignored the comment and gone on with our lives.

Because of his example, I have decided NOT to unfriend this person. In Matthew 28:19ff Jesus tells me, "Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe every thing I have commanded you. And remember I am with you always to the end of the age." Most of the civilized world at that time was pagan. Jesus died at the hands of the pagan Romans.

Even Paul offered the love of Christ to the pagans. In Acts 17 Paul is in Areopagus preaching on the steps of the temple of the "Unknown God". He preached to the Athenians about how worthless their gods fashioned out of stone were and how Jesus is alive and ready to be Lord of their lives. Read that chapter and we see a great example of how to witness to pagans.

My chief worry is for the people that will watch these pagan rituals and think that is the "truth." But Paul tells me in Romans 1, "For God's wrath is revealed from heaven against all godlessness and unrighteousness of people who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth since what can be known about God is evident among them because God has shown it to them from the creation of the world His invisible attributes, that is, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what He has made. As a result, people are without excuse...They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served something created instead of the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen."

Have I picked a fight with he and his friends? Probably. But with your prayers and God's help, I MAY be able to plant some seeds of doubt about his pagan practices. Please pray for me that everything I say will be said in love and I will be able to communicate my love for him as a creation of God while telling about the salvation available through Christ. Thank you for your prayers.