Counties Evangelist, Lee Marsland, shares how Encounter Ministries is seeing God at work.

Lee is the Community Pastor in Oldham working with Encounter Ministries. He’s married to Lesley and has a heart for the lost in the community. He has a real passion for street preaching, regularly going out with members of the local church onto the streets of Manchester, Blackpool, and parts of Wales to sing worship songs and share testimonies, as well as preaching the Gospel and offering prayer. As part of their ministry, they run the Lighthouse, a facility that provides food, support, and fellowship to those in need.

LEE’S STORY

As part of their ministry at the Lighthouse, Lee spends so much of his time with people on the ‘margins’ of society - just like Jesus. In today’s ‘Testimony Tuesday’, he shares some lovely stories of God’s grace.

“We had a guy called David Buckley who used to be one of our VIPs at our Lighthouse ministry, he was vulnerable, and after months of attending, I felt the Lord leading me to share the Gospel with him and he gave his life to Jesus and shortly after he got baptised. He’s been coming every week for months - but about six weeks or so ago he went to the hospital and the Drs found a cancerous tumor, He came to see me and was quite upset, especially as he had found faith in Christ, so we prayed before he was due to start chemotherapy and after having a scan it showed that the tumor had dramatically started to shrink so he came to the Lighthouse last week to testify to God’s healing power. David now volunteers at the Lighthouse as he has experienced how it is a beacon of hope for those who are broken and lost. He loves being able to give something back.”

Testimony 2

”Just a fortnight ago a man in his 50s came to the Lighthouse. He was sleeping rough in a local cemetery, He was told about the Lighthouse and how the church would try to help him, so he came he was quite upset and seemed desperate, so after giving him a hot meal, we shared the Gospel and asked if we could pray for his situation, the very next day, he was taken off the streets and moved into accommodation, he came on Tuesday to say thank you and that our prayers worked.”

Testimony 3

”A man called Nigel saw us on Facebook and liked what we do for the homeless etc. and decided to start gathering lots of donations for the Lighthouse. After two visits, he asked us why we do what we do, so we told him about Jesus and he was moved to tears. Right there and then gave his life to Jesus and is now a regular volunteer and goes above and beyond to help others.”