Stephannie is a light at Morey’s Piers. She’s a local, and a social butterfly that makes the international students feel welcomed and loved. You would think that being on missions, I would have reached out to her, but she found me. During a more difficult day at work, I found myself in the break area by myself, shoving a quesadilla down as fast as I could before my break ended. In my hunger and weariness, I lost sight of my vision, and had tunneled on the food in front of me. I intentionally sat alone, so that I wouldn’t feel burdened or guilty for not interacting with coworkers. And this is when I met Stephannie. By simply sitting down and saying hello she tore back the curtain on the disgusting selfish desires of my heart. From that day on, she served as a rebuke and reminder of how badly I needed God to love people.
Stephannie and I developed a fun and surface level friendship quickly, but God began to show me how he was working through international cafe. I invited Stephannie to our event and she arrived promptly at 8:00 as we opened our doors. I went through all the evangelism tool games you could think of. I saw that there was clear brokenness in her life but she was closed off and unwilling to share. As the night came to a close and she returned home, I felt as though I had failed, as if I was the one in control of her faith. I couldn’t stop thinking to myself, “What could I have done differently? What could I have said? Why couldn’t she see the good news the way I did?” I truly felt I failed but isn’t that so prideful?
The following Monday, for reasons I’ll share in another post (hit me with that follow :D), I was doing a water only fast for those 24 hours. In this time, God allowed me to truly take captive of seemingly every thought and bring it to Him in prayer. One of these passing thoughts was seeing Stephanie. During my shift, I can see everyone who walks by to the break area and I enjoy greeting my coworkers. But on this day, when Stephannie walked by, I like to think that God broke my heart the way that His does at the sight of one of his lost children. I couldn’t help but to cry out to Him and ask Him to soften her heart. It’s been difficult for me to ask things like this of the Lord. I am merely a stroke in his enormous painting, so how could I be so bold as to ask Him of things? But when God really touched my heart, I remembered that I am his child that can BOLDLY approach his throne, for Jesus died and the veil was torn and it is finished. I can speak these requests to Him in confidence that he is listening, as a Father patiently listens for his child’s first words. And not only does he listen, but he responds.
Later that night, Stephannie returned to international cafe. She already knows plenty of my teammates and was enjoying time to socialize with them. After welcoming her in I, spent time meeting some international students. But the next time I saw her, she was in tears. Through a small ice-breaker activity, she was reminded of her late father. And in that, the door in her heart for our heavenly father flung open. After my friend Makoto and I were conversing with her and comforting her, we took her through the KGP(Knowing God Personally) booklet, a tool to assist us in concisely and accurately presenting the Gospel. It was a slow process and I couldn’t stop praying for God to work in her heart, that she would not grow bored with every new page, that she would fight to understand rather than blindly agreeing, but ultimately that she would desire the Savior I so desperately wanted her to see. When I flipped to the page that states, “You Can Receive Christ Right Now Through Prayer”, my heart was beating out of my chest. I was so so excited, but so unreasonably nervous, that somehow her heart would harden on the final page. And while there were lots of questions on her part, and even more explaining on mine, as of July 30th (it had past midnight) Stephannie gave her life to follow Christ.
In the week following this day Stephannie has been reading the Word daily, and not only that, but she has new questions about it for me every time I see her!! Please pray for her heart as she is surrounded by nonbelievers and that God would use her as a light that shines for Him in this community 🙂 Welcome to the familia
I’m sorry for this drawn out story that could have been stated in a sentence and I’m sure most of you didn’t write an 72 page report and flex on everyone with your similar experiences, but I cannot help but to share the entirety of this story because I desire to truly and fully share the JOY that is in my heart. God is so so soooooo good.
Dillon Kim Ministry Updates 