Unlike concreting or car mechanics, teaching is one of those tasks for which it is often difficult to see any tangible results for your effort. It is the same with preaching the word of God.
Recently a team of church members presented Easter seminars at Oak Flats High School. Approximately seventy-five students in total attended. Most had never heard of the personal significance for them of the death and resurrection of Jesus, and students left each seminar visibly unchanged.
Was all the preparation and effort a waste of time? Not at all!
In Isaiah 55:10-11, God says:
“For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven and do not return there but water the earth, making it bring forth and sprout, giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater,
so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth; it shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose, and shall succeed in the thing for which I sent it.”
Perhaps the seminar planted a gospel seed in some students, which another preacher will water in the future before they are brought into God’s kingdom (1 Corinthians 3:6-9). Maybe that will not happen. What we do know for certain is that whatever the final result, God’s word does not fail to accomplish His purposes!
Paul says this:
“Therefore, my beloved brothers, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord your labor is not in vain.”
1 Corinthians 15:58
– PHIL PRATT