When we think of those whom we know who are lost, they are likely on our mind and heart frequently. We pray for them, and we pray for ourselves to have the wisdom to know what to say and when. You could say that we are “aiming” our efforts at them in the interest of reaching them.
Sometimes it isn’t someone you know who you are trying to reach out to. When we are involved in a door-knocking campaign we probably won’t know the person who opens the door. Regardless, we are aiming our efforts at this person we are about to meet.
There are plenty of examples of these kinds of concerted efforts yielding the desired results. You aimed at them. You focused on them. You pursued them. They responded to the message of the gospel. There is nothing more important than rescuing a soul from certain destruction.
But there is another dynamic at work that we can never take lightly. Sometimes the message we are presenting hits someone we weren’t even aiming at. How many times has it happened that the one being pursued expresses little or no interest in the gospel, but there was someone else listening to the conversation who was convicted and responded to the truth. And you weren’t even aiming at them!
When we read in Acts 16 about Paul and Silas in prison in Philippi, before they had been thrown in prison, they had already been able to reach some of the people they were aiming at, specifically Lydia and her household. But this would not be the only household they would reach. By the end of this night the Philippian jailer and his household would also come to believe. Paul and Silas weren’t even aiming at him! But the truth found the jailer’s heart, nevertheless.
Years ago, at a congregation where I was a member, a request was made from someone in town for a Bible study. Two of the men from the congregation got together to respond. They had their information slightly off and ended up knocking on the “wrong” door. The person who answered the door pointed out their mistake but expressed an interest in a Bible study as well. Long story short, this was the person who ended up being converted. The person they were supposed to study with ultimately wasn’t interested. Not only was the person they studied with converted, so was her husband who later served as an elder! And the two men who went out on the study in the first place weren’t even aiming at her!
Many years ago, a distant relative of mine was living in the New York city area. They were a derelict just living on the streets. On one occasion there was a gospel meeting going on nearby. After the meeting, people were leaving the meeting walking past this homeless person who was passed out from alcohol. One of the people passing by saw a church tract lying on the street and picked it up and put it in the pocket of the drunk. When he woke up the next day, he found the tract. The information in the tract led him to seek the truth about God. He was ultimately converted along with his family also. Who was aiming at him?!
Sometimes I think we believe we need to see the conversion of someone we are trying to reach from beginning to end so we can see the fruit of our efforts. We want to see that we hit what we aimed at, but it doesn’t always go that way.
We most certainly need to be trying to consciously reach out to the lost and have our aim on them, but we also need to remember the parable of the sower. The sower did not look to see if he had “hit the mark.” He just went about sowing the seeds of the kingdom.
We are to be ready to share and live the truth whether we are aiming it at someone in particular or not. The power of the Word of God doesn’t depend on our marksmanship.
