‘We’ve given out over 4,000 Bibles on the streets of London’

My mate Angus saw a post on social media from friends in Australia: they had a stand on the street and loads of Bibles. He messaged me and said: “Do you want to buy some Bibles and go give them out?” So, we bought 100 Bibles, printed a sign that said: “Free Bible?” and took the tube to Trafalgar Square. 

When we got there and saw the people, we thought: What have we got ourselves into? We walked around, praying, for ten minutes, not wanting to set up because it was terrifying. Finally, we said: “OK, we’ve got to do it.” 

We got our Bibles out and prayed: “Lord, do what you want to do. We’re here for the one person.” 

A family came up and the mother said: “We just became Christians. We’ve never been to church, we don’t have any Bibles, but this morning, I prayed for a sign – and here you are!” They all got a Bible; we prayed and they were crying and encountering God. It was beautiful. 

That day, we gave out 80 Bibles and prayed for 75 people. It was the easiest evangelism I’ve ever done. 

We bought another 100 Bibles and went out in Hammersmith. It was so fruitful. A guy called Harry came along to the stand. He had just flown in from Peru. He said he wasn’t meant to be in Hammersmith, but here he was. He heard the gospel, we prayed for him and invited him to church. When he came, he plonked his bag down and immediately fell to his knees and just started worshipping God. Then he fell prostrate. Everyone was declaring praises to God and Harry started shouting: “Jesus is Lord! Jesus is Lord!” We prayed for him and asked: “Do you want to accept Jesus right now?” And he said: “Yes!”

We kept buying Bibles and giving them to people each week. We’ve seen God heal people. There’s been so many testimonies of people coming out of the New Age and into faith. We’ve seen 37 people commit their lives to Jesus and we’ve given out over 4,000 Bibles. 

There’s definitely an increasing openness to faith. On the street, very few people we speak to call themselves atheists. 

In my generation, people want to share their faith. They want to tell their friends. It’s natural for them because they’ve experienced something real. Most of my friends bring people along to church or to Alpha. 

The statistics might show a general decline in the Church, but I’m not really too bothered about the numbers. You’ve just got to work the patch God has given you and fertilise it. 

My mate Angus says that evangelism is the opposite of sin. Sin looks really appealing. You want to do it, but you go away feeling horrible. Often, you don’t want to do evangelism. You think it’s going to be horrible. But when you do it, you feel revived. It’s tiring on the body but really good for the soul. You can’t understand how good it is until you’ve pushed through and just said: “Jesus, I’m gonna do it!”

More on this story:

• ‘It’s bonkers’, ‘God is blowing my mind’: Is something special happening among Gen Z?
• There is a hunger for God’s presence in young people that we haven’t seen before
• ‘We’re seeing people come to know Jesus more easily than we were five years ago’

James Campbell-Wynter, 19, is a gap-year student at St Paul’s Hammersmith in London