Fishers of Men
- Leader
-
Today, we’re going to talk about patience. Does anybody know a good definition for patience? What does it mean to have patience?
- Child
-
It means to wait.
- Leader
-
Right, when you can wait for things. Sometimes, that is kind of hard. I thought I would talk to you about a sport in which you have to have a lot of patience. That sport is fishing. Have you two guys ever been fishing? Okay. Or girls, have any of you girls ever been fishing? All right.
You have to have a lot of patience when you go fishing. Did you know that there are some rules that you have to know for when you go fishing? The number one rule is,
Be properly equipped. That means that you have to have the right stuff to get some fish.
You have to have a nice fishing pole that has a hook on it. On that hook, we would put one of those big, fat, juicy worms. You have to be properly equipped to go fishing.
Another rule to go fishing is you have to put your reading in action. If I read about that there are fish at Normandy Lake, then I would have to go to Normandy Lake to find the fish. I couldn’t get the fish just because I read about them.
The number three rule about fishing is you have to have patience. You guys know that when you throw your line into the water, the fish just doesn’t automatically bite your hook. You have to wait.
You know what? Jesus had a lot of friends that were fisherman and one day, he saw these guys fishing and he walked by them and he said, “Come follow me and be fishers of men.” What that meant was that Jesus wanted these guys to follow after him and he wanted them to go with him to tell everyone about him and get them to follow Jesus. Just like when we go fishing, there are rules for catching people and getting them to follow Jesus. Let’s look at the rules for catching men, ready?
The number one rule is to be properly equipped. You’re doing that right now. You’re going to church and Sunday School and children’s church and you’re listening to all the things that we’re telling you. One day, you’re going to be able to go out and invite people to come to church. One day, some of you, somebody sitting here right now might even be a Preacher. You’re doing the right thing.
The number two rule about catching people for Jesus is to put your reading in action. When you go to bed at night, here’s what I hope: I hope you have a children’s Bible and I hope that you take that children’s Bible to bed and read for a little while in that Bible and learn the stories about Jesus. Then, after you get a lot of knowledge, then you can start telling others about these stories.
The third rule about catching people for Jesus is that you have to have patience. That’s right. Even if you invite somebody to church one time, they might, and they actually probably won’t come if you just invite them once. If you invite them again and again and you tell them all the fun stuff that we do here, like Vacation Bible School . You tell them about that kind of stuff, they’re going to start listening and they’re going to start paying attention.
Have patience even if you invite somebody one time and they say, “No, I can’t go,” just keep, in a gentle way, reminding them that you love them and that we would love to have them here.
Let’s have word of prayer. Dear Jesus (Dear Jesus), help us to be (help us to be) fishers of men.