The Value of the Number 1

1, uno, one…a pretty simple number and concept.

I was recently reading the report of the Great Commission Task Force of the Southern Baptist Convention. True, some of it was a bit tedious, but there was some very compelling thoughts as well.

Consider these numbers:
There are 6.8 billion people in the world. Nearly 4 billion of those people have little to no access the gospel of Jesus Christ.
In America there are about 340 million people. A safe estimate is that 258 million of those people are lost.

Those numbers grip me!

Listen to what Ronnie Floyd writes, “To the degree we grasp lostness will be the degree we are willing to do whatever is necessary to penetrate it. If we do not understand lostness intellectually and theologically we will not change nor will we do what must be done to penetrate it. I am convinced we have not only forgotten what it is like to be lost, but we act as if lostness does not exist, there is no real hell, and many times, conduct ourselves as Universalists.”

That is right on! Lostness does exist and to ignore it is the equivalent of depraved indifference.

Imagine I am walking my dog and come around the corner to see an accident. A young boy has been struck by a hit and run driver. The boy is bleeding there in the street with very grave injuries. He is in desperate need of help. I am there, I see it, and I do nothing. If I do nothing that is actually a crime. I can be charged by the law for “depraved indifference”. I saw the situation. I knew the need. I could have called for help, or administered first aid. But, since I did not, that is a crime.

How much of a crime is it to know that according to the words of scripture that there are people who are lost and dying? They are in a grave situation. I know first aid. I know the gospel of their salvation. I am aware of their condition and can do something to help. To do nothing is a crime. It is a crime against those people. It is a crime against God.

The numbers are staggering, but what I need to focus on is a smaller number. It is the number 1. Just one more. I can’t share the gospel with 4 billion people. But, I can share the gospel with one. And then I can share the gospel with just one more. And then, one more, and one more. There is one person who needs someone to stop and render the spiritual aid of the gospel. Am I going to be the 1? Are you going to be the 1?