I’m often drawn to the numbers. There is something in us that likes big numbers. Over four hundred thousand at a Franklin Graham Crusade in Ethiopia. Eight hundred saved at a “listener meeting” in Indonesia. It is exciting to see the Lord move in such a big way.

But what about the ministry that labors and sees little or no visible results? Is that ministry diminished in God’s sight? Do we humanly think more of the big results than those who labor and see only a handful of people respond?

Sadly, that happens.

The heavenly hosts rejoice at the magnitude of the thousands responding to these big events. There is no less rejoicing for the one person who is led to Jesus by a small ministry struggling to keep going, wondering if what they are doing is making a difference.

I was struck by a quote from Oswald Chambers.

“If God chooses for you to labor in total obscurity, what is that to you?”

“But Lord, it’s the big events that grab the headlines and draw notice.” And the Lord replies to my heart, “How many sheep, out of his flock of one hundred, did the shepherd seek and find? Wasn’t there rejoicing over the one that was saved?”

It is easy to get discouraged when the response to the Gospel is small. There are countless stories of missionaries, pastors, and average Christians who faithfully share the hope of salvation through faith in Jesus without seeing significant results. Often, what emerges is the ongoing impact of a single life touched by those faithful servants. Max Lucado shared his thoughts on this:

“Faithful servants have a way of knowing answered prayer when they see it, and a way of not giving up when they don’t.”

I follow some ministries that labor long and hard, with results that are small compared to other ministries. Yet they faithfully continue to bring hope to the hopeless by sharing the only hope for our world—Jesus.

Evangelist David Wilkerson was rejected when he tried to share the Gospel with gang members in New York City. Yet he kept his focus on Jesus and the Holy Spirit, not on results. Wilkerson once wrote:

“When God calls you to something, He is not always calling you to succeed, He’s calling you to obey! The success of the calling is up to Him; the obedience is up to you.”

Hear me. I’m not saying you shouldn’t dream big dreams for the Lord. God may give you a big vision with a goal of big results for the Savior. But we can’t let the results we see with our human eyes be our only gauge of “success.”

The writer of Hebrews gave us good insight into the connection between faithfulness to God’s call and any results.

Let us hold tightly without wavering to the hope we affirm, for God can be trusted to keep his promise.

Hebrews 10:23 NLT

It is always the right thing to adjust our human thinking to God’s thoughts and ways. His calling is higher, and His results are more significant than anything we could hope or imagine…even if the visible results seem small.

God’s best,