The Straight Track

“Five boys, playing in the woods one winter day, decided to see who could make the straightest set of tracks in the snow. They were very careful to put one foot directly in front of the other, but when they had crossed the clearing, one track was curved, one was crooked, and two were almost zigzag. Only one boy had a straight track. When they asked him how he did it, he replied that he had not looked at his feet; he had picked out a tree across the clearing and had walked straight toward it.

 

If we are to leave a straight track in our daily walk, we must not have our minds centered on ourselves. We must fix our gaze upon the Lord Jesus Christ. We are to “run with patience the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus…” (Donald Grey Barnhouse).

 

Tracing the Source

They say confession is good for the soul, so here is one. In high school, I loved playing the game Dots and Boxes. Here is my confession, I got really good thanks to my teachers…well, actually, I got good due to the time I spent in detention, LOL. The game starts with an empty grid of dots. Usually, two players take turns adding a single horizontal or vertical line between two unjoined adjacent dots. A player who completes the fourth side of a 1×1 box earns one point and takes another turn. The player with the most boxes wins.

 “You can count the apples on the tree,

but who can count the apples in a seed?”

 

This is what happens with the life of one committed person. They grow their circle of influence exponentially. This is what occurred in the life of Edward Kimball who volunteered to teach a young boys' Sunday School class in the church he was attending. Mr. Kimball not only prayed for the hyper boys in his class, but he also sought to win each one to the LORD by personally investing himself in each of them. His pledge, “I will be intentional with every single last one of them.” There were plenty of days he thought about throwing in the towel. If you have ever taught young boys, you know that the experience can often be like herding cats.

One young man in class Dwight, didn’t seem to understand what the gospel was about, so Mr. Kimball went to the shoe store one Saturday where he was stocking shelves. Mr. Kimball shared with him in the stock room the importance of a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. That young man was Dwight L. Moody. That Saturday in the stockroom Dwight believed the gospel and received Jesus Christ as his Savior. In his lifetime, Dwight L. Moody touched two continents for GOD, connecting dots with thousands professing Christ through his ministry.

The story doesn’t end there. Actually, it is just another dot being connected. Under Moody, another young man’s heart was touched by GOD Wilbur Chapman. Chapman became the evangelist who preached to thousands. One day, a professional ball player had a day off and attended one of Chapman’s meetings, and thus, Billy Sunday was converted.

Sunday quit baseball and became part of Chapman’s ministry team connecting another dot. Subsequently, Chapman accepted the pastorate of a large church, and Billy Sunday began his own evangelistic crusades connecting more dots. Sunday literally preached to millions, and it is estimated over 300,000 came to a saving knowledge of Christ at his crusades.

The next connection came when a young man attending one of Sunday’s crusades was converted, whose name was Mordecai Ham. He was a scholarly, dignified gentleman who wasn’t above renting a hearse and parading it through the streets advertising his meetings. When Ham came to Charlotte, North Carolina, a sandy-haired, lanky young man, then in high school, vowed he would never go hear him preach, but Billy Frank, as he was called by his family, did eventually go. Ham announced he knew for a fact that a house of “ill repute” was located across the street from the local high school and that male students were skipping lunch to visit the house across the street. When students decided to go to interrupt the meetings of Mordecai Ham, Billy Frank decided to go see what would happen.

That night Billy Frank went and was intrigued by what he heard. Returning another night, he responded to the invitation and was converted connecting, yet another dot. He was called Billy Frank by his family; at birth, he was called William Franklin Graham, and to the world, he became known as Billy Graham, the evangelist; who preached to more people than any other person who ever lived, including the Apostle Paul. There have been hundreds of thousands of dots connected through the life and ministry of Bill Graham. Every one of us is bound to one another; yes, we are a host of dots connected to, and waiting to be connected.

Who can count the apples in a seed...JESUS CHRIST can!!! There is so much darkness in the world today, but take hope there will always be light because JESUS is everywhere. There will always be a dot waiting to be connected with, and it’s your move!

Your friend and brother,

Jay Adam