Setting Its Sites By Dr. Bill Lewis
Written for the September 2005 Georgia State Association of FWB Promotional Bulletin
While going through basic training in the Marine Corp, we reached the point when it was time to qualify with a rifle. A week of the training was set aside on the firing range for the recruits to adjust their sites and to practice for the qualifying day. A lot of rounds were expended as the recruits fired their rifles and adjusted their sites to create an ever tightening firing pattern. The process was to focus and refocus on the target until each shot hit within the bull’s-eye. To qualify with an acceptable score, the recruits focused on the bull’s-eye as if nothing else was important in life. It is necessary for Christians to focus and refocus on that which is truly important in life. Paul wrote to the Philippians, “Brethren, I do not count myself to have apprehended; but one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead, I press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus” (NKJV 3:13-14). To help the Christian refocus, God provides a fellowship of believers and pastor-teachers. Open Door Fellowship strives to help Christians refocus by helping them to follow the example of Paul. Paul said that he moved forward by “forgetting those things which are behind.” Often it is the past that throws off your sites. You loose site of the bull’s-eye because past sins and failures make your forward vision hazy. To refocus your vision on God, you need to get involved with God’s Word. Open Door Fellowship works to help believer’s get involved with God’s Word by staying in the Word. In addition to Sunday messages that are Bible based, an opportunity for study has been added at 11:00 AM on Wednesday. Yes AM is correct. Since most of those who currently attend are retired or work at night, it has been necessary to schedule the mid-week study in the morning. Sometime helping others refocus on that which is important requires that the church do some refocusing also. To further help people refocus on that which is important, a fifth Sunday night service was recently held when supporting area churches attended Open Door Fellowship. The visiting churches (Homerville FWB, Cool Springs FWB, and Hahira FWB) lent their talent to the service by providing music, drama, and testimonies. The evening service, planned and directed by Joey and Amy Fitzgerald, was successful in helping us all refocus our worship toward God. If you begin to think that you have “apprehended” (individual or church), you cease trying to refocus your life. It does not take long for a church or an individual in this state to loose site altogether of that which is important. Pray that Open Door Fellowship will continually refocus its sites by “forgetting those things which are behind” and by “reaching forward to those things which are ahead.” It is important that Open Door Fellowship, “press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.”