More than 24,000 people filled the Cần Thơ Stadium in Vietnam last month to seek Jesus during the Season of Love Festival with Evangelist Franklin Graham. It was a major turnout of people hungry to hear the gospel of Jesus Christ. “The Gospel transcends all languages and cultures,” Graham, president and CEO of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association (BGEA), said. “We praise God for the hundreds of people whose hearts were moved, and they responded to the invitation to trust Jesus Christ as their Savior and follow Him as Lord of their lives!” Over 315 churches and pastors came together to plan and pray for the two-day outreach. As a result, 14,000 people participated on the first night and 10,000 stood in the pouring rain on the second night to hear powerful messages on salvation. Altogether, more than 1,200 made decisions for Christ. “Rain is a sign of God’s blessing in the Bible, and today we saw God pour out His blessings on Vietnam,” Graham shared on Facebook. “It was a privilege to see so many people respond to God’s invitation to receive Jesus Christ by faith tonight.”
According to the BGEA, opportunities to share the gospel in the communist nation are increasing. “We’re there to share the love of Christ,” said Festival Director Derek Forbes, adding that the government keeps giving them opportunities to host outreaches. “We really have been given a lot of freedom,” he said. The ministry held its first evangelistic outreach in the nation in 2017 for its Love Hanoi Festival and then completed the Spring Love Festival in Ho Chi Minh City last year. They set up the outreach in the Mekong River Delta, Cần Thơ, due to its 13 sprawling provinces full of rice fields and rural farmland. “It makes it a bit different environment than last year in Ho Chi Minh,” Forbes continued. “There are churches, but they are smaller and fewer in number.” BGEA explains that despite the difficulties, residents of mainly Buddhist or atheist background joined in to hear worship led by Charity Gayle, The Afters, and Vietnamese artists, and listened to a Gospel message from Graham.
“I asked them if their souls were safe and secure in the hands of Almighty God. There are not many roads to God. There is only one road—and that’s through the cross of Jesus Christ,” Graham recalled telling the crowd. One 60-year-old named Nguyen told the ministry that although she had heard of Jesus, she avoided Him. “Ever since I was a teenager, I avoided making a decision to follow Jesus because Buddhism was familiar,” she said. But she said Graham’s message during the outreach gave her a “newfound hope.” “I heard every word Franklin Graham said. I listened very carefully when he said if I seek God, I will find Him,” she told BGEA. “I want to trust Jesus as my Savior, and I want to follow Jesus as my Lord.” Nguyen is like thousands of others who put their faith in Christ. “We praise God for the way He moved and the lives that have been changed for eternity,” BGEA shared on X. Meanwhile, Graham is asking Christians around the world to pray for the new believers in Vietnam and for all of the churches here that are now coming alongside them in their walk with Christ?”
Source: CBNNews
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