• Shall We Strive For Numbers?

  Contributed by Dave Mcfadden on Nov 16, 2004 (message contributor)

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  Scripture:  None

  Tags:  Evangelism How To, Evangelism Urgency

  Denomination: Baptist

"Shall We Strive For Numbers?"

Someone recently said, "I am not interested in numbers. I would rather have a spiritual Sunday School class than a big one."

I found myself agreeing and determined to pray and prepare my lesson unusually well for next Sunday. At least MY class would be a spiritual one. I didn’t send the usual little cards as reminders to the class; nor did I visit any prospects; I just let them go, but I did have a lesson well prepared. And then came Sunday.

David was absent. Had his dad, so recently saved, taken him fishing again? Were they slipping away from Sunday School and away from God? My heart felt a sharp jab of pain. Jimmie wasn’t there. Could he be sick again? What about Charles? Did he ever get those new shoes and was he sitting out on a woodpile feeling "blue" because he didn’t make it to Sunday School?

I gave my prepared lesson. But those three - what good did it do them?

This week I sent then the prettiest cards I could find, I called them over the phone, I visited them even.

The constant cry in my heart was, "God, don’t let them slip away and grow up in sin and careless living. Please, God, bring them back."

Shall we strive for numbers? Yes, oh, yes! when it comes to MY boys, let’s have numbers - all eleven of them!