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Fishers of Men

Bless Your Heart by Cindy Colley

Mama’s K.I.S.S. #80: Enroll in Evangelism

Posted on November 6, 2025

As you know, if you’ve been reading, for quite some time, I’ve occasionally been running little installments called “Mama’s K.I.S.S.” I know that lots of readers could give many more and far more creative ideas than I can offer, but these installments are just a few tried and true and mostly old-fashioned ideas for putting service hearts in our kids.  This is number 80 of a list of one hundred ways we train our kids to serve. K.I.S.S. is an acronym for “Kids In Service Suggestions”.

I know bunches of these little service posts for kids have been centered on evangelism. But this time I want to give you some programs that are so worthy of your kids’ participation to train them for the very most important job we do here for eternity.

First of all, there are so many arms of The House to House School of  Evangelism in which kids can be involved. Specifically, my kids are super involved in the Mission One meetings that our congregation does on a monthly basis. This team of soul-minded people meet together for a meal and a meeting each month and have a power planning session about next steps for every person who is a prospective Christian. Sometimes these folks are not ready for an actual study and our members brainstorm about ways we can get to know them or make them feel like we love them… and we do! So at each meeting the kids (and their mama) get a little assignment that they take very seriously. It may be to take food and visit a person who is in rehab or to go and visit and help a neighbor who  has lost a loved one or to invite a friend to an event and offer childcare. Each month, the kids are aware and praying for the “next step”. Another group meets early on Sunday nights to send cards to anyone in our community who has had a big life event in the family: a birth, a death in the family, a move, an illness, an accident or injury. Kids are often present in these signing meetings, as well. This is a perpetually revolving list, as you can imagine and our members are responsible for turning in these card recipients with addresses… those they know about who have had these life changes. From this “compassion card” list often, but not always, comes a list of people to add to the Mission One meeting discussions. This is a program of evangelism in which your kids can participate but, as you can easily see, both of these activities can happen right from your home, even without the presence of a church program. You can read about the official program here:https://evangelism.housetohouse.com/

Next, there’s World Bible School. Your teen kids can grade correspondence courses from around the world and even converse with those students as they progress toward the saving blood. Technology has made this easier and better than ever before. Even your small kids can stuff the envelopes and help copy the addresses. for the ones that are going through the postal service. And this list of people waiting for a study partner grows all the time. Home

Last, for today, if you have teens I’d recommend finding and enrolling in a Fishers of Men” class. It’s a twelve week course that’s so very good for “getting your feet wet” for eventual deep-water fishing for men. It’s here: Home

I know you can’t do all of these, but be sure to do something to  get those little feet ready to be “shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace” (Eph. 6:15)! Life is short!

 

 

Bless Your Heart by Cindy Colley

Sister to Sister: Lessons from the One that Got Away

Posted on September 12, 2019

The gospel is simply profound. Seeing the kingdom as a pearl with great value or imagining the soul in danger as a sheep that’s wandered from the flock or viewing immersion in water as the cleansing of the conscience is uncomplicated, yet ironically complex in consequence. The precepts of the gospel are elementary, yet infinitely weighty. 

So it is with the simple words Jesus said to the Galilean fishermen, as they walked away from their nets to answer the invitation that would forever change their worlds. He said to them “Follow me and I will make you fishers of men” (Matthew 4:19).

Every Christian who has ever cast a hook into the lake at sunrise has surely pondered this “fisherman” analogy while sitting quietly, patiently under a tree watching the “bobber” rhythmically move with the placid waves. I got to spend an early morning last week on the bank of Lake Guntersville.  I’d been thinking about how you don’t catch a fish every time you cast. In fact, it usually takes a lot of casting, waiting, winding, re-baiting and re-casting before you ever get a fish on the line. I considered how many contacts we have to make before we get an interested, seeking soul. I thought about how those nearby boatmen were making so much noise that, surely, the fish in this part of the lake would be driven to deeper, quieter waters. So it is with the gospel. Distractions and disturbances cause many to go the other way.

I saw about ten big turtles for every fish I saw. (Really, that lake must be a Chelonian reptile sanctuary.)  Sometimes, in evangelism, the reptiles (particularly the old snake of the garden) are so busy that the fish can’t even find the bait that is the gospel. There are just many very simple, but profound, comparisons one thinks about on the fishing bank. 

But then there was this big one (analogy and fish) that was the highlight of that morning at the lake. My husband, who wasn’t fishing, and I were quietly talking about a marriage problem in a faraway place that was on both our minds as we  texted counsel from that fishing bank. I’d been praying about it for several days and, well, I had just became absorbed in the conversation, when a very strong pull on my rod (which was in my lap) bolted me from that bench as I threw my phone at my husband, shouting  “Take this!” 

“What’s wrong?” he shouted. 

“I’m fishing! I have a fish…a big one!”  

I got to the business of giving that rod a big yank and reeling in that line for dear life. I could already see myself telling the grandchildren, my fishing buddies, about this…well… at least four pound…bass. I t was a long and energetic “reeling in” to the cheers of my supportive photographer. 

But alas, just as that fish surfaced—just above the water, giving a massive jerk, he broke my line. That line must have had a worn or weak place just above the bobber because, that’s where it broke. I wished, if that big fish was going to break my line, he could have broken it near the hook, swam away, and I could have forgotten about him. But, as it was, my bobber, floated and bobbed (with flair) all around that little peninsula on which I was sitting, for the next hour. The most disheartening thing was not even that he broke my line and got away. It was watching that bobber’s lively movements, taunting me, looking forevermore like I should be jerking and reeling, when, in reality I had no connection at all, anymore to that bobber or that big fish. I looked for a boat. Someone could put a net under that fish, still. I considered the nearby pool net. It had a long pole attached to it; but, sadly, not long enough. So I just watched my bobber, my fish, as he taunted, teased and jeered at me, still looking, for all the world, like I should be jerking and reeling and having him for supper. 

So today… Six lessons (about evangelism) from the one that got away:

  1. Even if your fish may “get away” in the end, reel with all your might. The practice will be good for you.
  2. Enlist the help of those people around you. Even if others aren’t “fishing” there’s something they can do. (Holding the phone and taking pictures was not as useful as getting a net would have been.) Help other people become fishers of men, too. (Of course, my husband is a great fisher of men. He just wasn’t a great help that morning on the bank.)
  3. Be prepared. Don’t go fishing with a line that’s inadequate for the job ahead. (Study the book, pray as if souls depended on it. They do.)
  4. Try to ignore the lively jig of the bobber after the fish has been lost. (Even the Lord said there are those who will not be “caught”; so we have to cut the losses and rebait (Mark 6:11). Don’t get discouraged by a loss. Make improvements in your “line” and try again.
  5. Don’t get enamored, involved, engrossed in the lake. My biggest temptation was to jump in there the moment the line broke and  try and grab that fish. The result, of course, would have been that I’d have gotten that lake all over me (moss, mud and all) and that fish would still be lost in the deep. That’s the way it is with the world. We can’t jump into the filth of the world in an attempt to get the “big one”. He will still get away and if we’ve jumped into sin, in the process of trying to “influence”, we will still lose the catch. But we will be dirty and full of regret.  
  6. There will always be the taunters. Tie on another hook and “cast your (line) on the other side” (John 21:6).