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When I was eight and my brother was fourteen, he sometimes let me tag
along when he and his buddies went fishing at a slough along the
Willamette river. It was a long walk to a spot where I’d never go
alone. I never hoped to catch anything, but George would bait my hook
and show me where to drop my line. He also gave careful instructions
about what to do if I saw my bobber bounce or felt a tug on my line.
One day remarkable day I caught five little sunfish, and the guys
caught none. George laughed and bragged on me. I felt pretty pleased
with myself, but I knew it wasn’t my know-how that had caught the fish.
It was his.
When I reached George’s mature age of fourteen, I became a fisher of
men, because I accepted Jesus as my Master Fisherman. But I didn’t do
so well with people as I had done with sunfish.
It has taken a lot of years, but I think I have found the method the
Lord would have me use.
Now, if I am to be a fisher of men (and women and kids too!) I am not
to be a whaler, hurling scripture like a harpoon. I am not to be a
gill-netter, using scripture to snare and entrap or even fish with hook
and bait. Rather, I am to be a feeder, like people at fish hatcheries,
casting scripture onto the surface of people’s lives, enticing them to
eat and come again and again, and grow healthy, until they see Christ
beyond me.
We each have our own style of evangelism. Maybe you like lake fishing
where large, receptive groups gather; maybe you like river fishing,
where the action is and the fish fiercely resist, as people may do out
on the streets and at your place of work. In addition to meeting those
people personally, publishers can get your writing to these and many
more.
Maybe you like a quiet home pond, your neighborhood. You can write not
only for your church publications, but also letters to the editor in
your local paper or better yet, offer a helpful weekly column. Whatever
you write, your faith in Christ will show through. The Master has
equipped each of us to fish in her own special way.
Whatever talents he has given us for people fishing, as writers, a
huge sea of people await us. And they are very hungry for good food!
Organic food source: Jesus said, “Stay connected to me and live in me
and I in you.. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself unless it
stays connected and lives from the vine, neither can you, unless you
stay connected and live in and from me. Apart from me you can do
nothing…. If you keep my commandments you will stay connected to me and
live in and from my love.” Elsie’s paraphrase of John 5:4
Elsie Larson
Author of the Women of Valor series
by Elyse Larson
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