Quiet Evangelism

After church I rode my moto over to Kayes Ndi using the pirogues to cross the river. The bridge is still under repair, and the old bridge is now under water from rainy season, so we have to go by ferry or pirogue. I first headed to see Modibo & Sanusy Diop who were sitting under a tree outside their yard. We chatted a bit about the ferries, my recent trip to Budapest, Houseni's eye operation, the MegaVoice player I loaned Modibo a few weeks ago, and the Duduya well digging progress. After a bit one of the kids came to announce lunch was finally ready, so naturally they invited me in to eat rice and sauce. I was surprised they hadn't eaten yet at 2:30pm. They were kind enuf to keep the peanut gravy away from me!

So I moved on to find Ousman Diop who had ridden with us to Kayes the other day from Dakar. I went first to his sister's on one end of the Bakaforo neighborhood and found he was staying with another brother at the other end! It was nice to chat with Abus Diop there a bit and give out one of the Bientot (Soon) broadsheet tracts (as at each place I visited today). So I rode over to the brother's and found the sister, Adama! She also was waiting for Diop with a couple of other ladies, Seleni and Jouba. While drinking some tea and chatting I tried to play one of the MegaVoice Bible stories in Fulani. They liked it quite a bit, but then while playing the chanted Psalms, the batteries died. With rain threatening I moved on to Idi Thiam's where we caught up a bit on folk, happenings, and my trip. I offered to read a Bible story and selected the Lord's prayer and comments in Luke 11 and we discussed it a bit. His idea of what is the Holy Spirit was mostly a Muslim concept, but much else was correct. This was one of the rare times Idi actually stayed on subject and discussed something without changing the subject for quite a jump!
Rain still ready to fall, I moved on to see Mahmadou Aan and Mamadou Dioum (both from Senegal) in the Sidiya neighborhood. We had a fine time of drinking tea and chatting about the Bible. Mr. Aan had recently helped another Ousman (Gene) translate a longish Christian book on the Seven Beautiful Signs in the Qu'ran. I also found out he'd lived in Cote Ivoire for about 15 years before coming to teach in Mali, and there had lived near a church and a number of Christians so had learned a lot then. Mr. Dioum also has lived in Liberia (speaks fair English) and learned a lot about the Kingdom of God there.
I'm trying not to speak of Christianity, baptism, Christ, Son of God, Trinity, evangelism, church, or other negative connotation code words, in my visits and presentations of the gospel. Neither am I in any way requiring attendance at church or other religious things to show whether one is a believer or not. I'm trying to let them make the declarations by themselves in their own time.
After much chat, and reading Ps 15 about the high bar of a just man, I offered to read the same Luke passage. We

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had an interesting discussion on the Lord's prayer, importunity in prayer, faith, what is the Holy Spirit, etc. Mr Aan has read one book, The Way of Salvation, and listened to most of The Way of Righteousness tapes, and other things, seems to have good answers and comments, so I feel he is getting close to the kingdom, PTL. I left several Bientots for Mr. Aan to give to friends, and a tape in Senegal's Wolof language on fasting for Mr Dioum (the Muslim month of fasting, Ramadan, begins shortly).
May the Lord continue to reveal Himself to these friends.