Stephen Bennett, a former homosexual who is now a Christian evangelist and ministry founder, brought a team of about 30 people together to witness to homosexuals as they attended "Carnival Week" this past Saturday in Provincetown, Massachusetts.

Provincetown, which is well known as the premier summer resort for homosexuals on the east coast, has been hosting Carnival Week since 1977. The city began the annual event to increase awareness of homosexual tourists in the region and attract summer business, and it has since grown to become one of the biggest weeklong "gay pride" events in the U.S.

Buddy Smith, an executive assistant with the American Family Association, joined with the Stephen Bennett Ministries group to participate in the "Project: P-Town" witnessing effort and says the Christian group's message was proclaimed in a hostile environment.

Smith says the group talked to many individuals at the festival and gave out more than 600 gift packets -- white bags bearing the phrase "You are truly precious is God's eyes" printed in pink, and filled with tracts, an evangelistic CD, and a Bible.

"We greeted them with the message that they are precious in God's eyes -- that's of course from 1 Peter 5:7. And in the packet was information about how to repent, how to come to know Christ as your Savior, and how to come out of homosexuality," Smith says.

Sadly, many people rejected the gift packages and were rude and antagonistic toward the Christian witnesses, due to an article printed in a local paper the previous day, which misrepresented the purpose of the evangelism effort.

A representative of Stephen Bennett Ministries says that the devil used the news article -- which suggested the group had come to "cure" homosexuality as if it were "a bad habit" -- to keep many from receiving the truth. But the ministry representative says, "God is sovereign. The packages got into the hands of the individuals they were meant to be in."

One unfortunate episode occurred when a drag queen began an altercation with several members of the witnessing team. Police arrived on the scene and the drag queen tried to have the Christians arrested for committing a "hate crime." But when the policeman in charge learned that their only "offense" had been to give the drag queen a Bible and tell him he was precious in God's sight, obviously the officer decided that no crime had been committed.

Although some homosexuals responded to the witnessing effort with anger and antagonism, Smith says he and the other ministry witnesses nevertheless managed to share the truth of the gospel at the event.

"As Christians, we certainly need to stand against the radical homosexual agenda that seems to be moving full-speed ahead in our nation. But at the same time, these are people for whom Christ died. He loves them and we love them. And we want to reach them with the hope that only Jesus Christ can bring them," Smith says.

Stephen Bennett Ministries is coordinating follow-up efforts with those people from the weekend event who want more information about the true hope found in a relationship with Jesus. The gift packages left over from Project P-Town will be distributed at future evangelistic outreaches to the homosexual community, which are already in the planning stages.

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