A Sure Thing

The most predictable thing about hunting and fishing is that it’s unpredictable. I don’t know why, but I forget that rule often, only to be rudely reminded of how true it is. Let me illustrate. I have hunted from tree stands where people have seen deer day after day from the same spot. When I get there, I only see “tweetie” birds and my body provides a smorgasbord for mosquitoes. I’ve taken off of work to hunt the turkeys that were gobbling their heads off all week only to see and hear nothing while I was in the woods. I duck hunted one day this year at a spot where hundreds of ducks were flying in daily on the lake. You guessed it; I only got cold and never fired a shot. I have also been known to “dry up” a good fishing hole on more than one occasion. Nothing is a sure thing in the hunting and fishing world.
I guess the rest of the world is not immune to this “nothing is a sure thing” rule either. Just look at the stock market and how it’s been lately. Look at the job situation in our own community where guys who have been with employers for many years are looking for new jobs. That’s the nasty part of the pill that we are forced to swallow in the broken world in which we live. It leaves a terrible after taste when you’ve invested so much time, effort, money, dedication, devotion, heart and soul into something. It surely makes one think, what was all the effort for?
God has a different view of things and has something to say about your efforts for Him. I Corinthians 15:58 says “…Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain.” If we are going to be totally honest, we must admit that we sometimes wonder if what we are doing is really making a difference for the Kingdom. It seems like the effort, the time, and all the stuff we do has no impact. But just when we let that kind of thinking creep into our minds – God reminds us that we make a difference, as he did with our guys recently.
By the time you read this article, the Heart of sportsman fellas will be fresh off a very busy February. We will have been to talk to others about sportsmen’s ministry, helped with a Sportsman’s banquet, and been serenaded by the songs of hundreds of coon hounds during our 3-day tour of duty at Walker Days (a huge coon hunting convention). Along the way we will have met hundreds of people and invested a little time in their lives. We may only for a brief minute step into a person’s life and in most cases will never see them again. Some guys will stick in our minds; others will be forgotten nearly as soon as they walk away. With such a brief glimpse at someone, we never really know what that person’s dealing with or going through in their life. What we do know is that all of them, every single one needs Jesus. I figured it up the other day and realized that the HOS guys have personally given away over 1000 DVD’s that share the Gospel, nearly 1000 tracts, and put over 600 Bibles into the hands of men just like us who love the outdoors.
What’s all that time and work for? Recently, one of our guys shared a story about the difference that something as simple as a DVD made in the life of someone he had met. He had given a DVD to this fella some time back. The fella stopped by and told him what a difference that message in the DVD had made. The DVD touched his heart and changed the way that he looked at life. His life was changed, all because someone cared enough about someone else and where they would spend eternity that he gave him a DVD. That’s what it’s all about!
You may never know what a difference your time and effort makes (this side of heaven, anyway) when doing Kingdom work. The thing we do know is that God tells us, to put it in my own words, your labor for the Lord, “ain’t in vain.” Now, that’s an investment you can count on!