Fishing

Last week I had the privilege of accompanying one of my students to her work station at school. Naomi is a third year art student at Robert Gordon University. I LOVE ART. And because I never had the opportunity to study art during my undergrad, I’m now living vicariously through people like Naomi who get to be immersed in art studies for four years. As I’ve mentioned before, one of my responsibilities is to make videos for our outreaches at the Hog’s Head pub every two weeks. We choose a topic and a question of the week, then I wander about the University campuses, looking for unsuspecting students who are willing to answer the question on camera. Once I’ve gathered enough footage I edit down all the responses to make a nice little film to show as an introduction to the preach at Hog’s Head. Naomi suggested I come with her a few times because she thought a number of her classmates would be interested in sharing their opinions.

As we went from student to student, I was really impressed to see how many Naomi had already told about Radiate and invited to Hog’s Head. I complimented her afterward for being so open and bold with her friends because I know that’s very hard to do. “Yeah……but none of them ever come” she replied. Unfortunately, this is a theme I’ve seen over and over in the lives of our students. They try really hard to show Christ to their friends and classmates, and I know that sometimes it appears that their efforts are in vain.

Another student, who has been saved less than a year, was telling me over lunch last week how hurt she was that none of her friends came to see her get baptized a couple of Sundays ago. None of them had excuses and none of them asked how it went afterward because they just don’t care about that part of her life. She said it hurt not only because the baptism was a really important event in her life, but “most of all because I really want them to see what God has done in my life. I want them to see that I’m not the same person I was a year ago.”

I could give you many more examples similar to these that I have seen just in the past two months since I’ve been here. As soon as their friends get the slightest idea that the event they’re being invited to has any kind of religious undertones or connections, regardless of how subtle, they immediately put up walls and are uninterested. I’m so proud of our students for the way they keep reaching out over and over. And you know what I think is really amazing...…the majority of our students don’t know what it’s like to be in the majority as a Christian. That’s something they’ve never experienced. They cannot believe that I come from a church in the States that has over 6,000 people. I, personally, don’t think I have ever experienced not being in the majority as a Christian until I moved here. In America, we are so blessed! It's just so different here. And until you experience it, it's hard to understand because they speak English and they're westernized and they're not dying of starvation or AIDS. They seem a lot like us, but the spiritual temperature is dramatically different.

A few weeks ago Joe talked about personal evangelism at a Big Sunday. He told a story about a guy in Barbados who was a professional fisherman. He took his small boat and nets out into the Caribbean everyday. A friend of Joe’s talked to this guy every morning when he came back in from fishing. Some days he had a catch, some days he didn’t. “Don’t you ever get discouraged for not catching any fish? Don’t you ever wake up in the morning and think, ‘I’m not bothering today’?” The fisherman simply responded, “Every day is a fishing day; but not everyday is a catching day.”

Wow. That is such an important philosophy for us to embrace. Every day is a fishing day, every single day, without exception. When we throw out the line and come up empty, we don't need to be discouraged because every day isn't a catching day. It just means we need to keep being faithful. Because if you want to catch something, you have to be fishing.

Please pray for us. Especially for our students, who are out on the frontlines everyday. Pray that they will keep fishing and that they will not lose heart and give up.