Then God remembered Noah, and every living thing, and all the animals that were with him in the ark. And God made a wind to pass over the earth, and the waters subsided. —Genesis 8:1

When we talk about Noah’s life, we tend to focus on the ark. But let’s turn our attention to Noah’s spiritual life for a moment. It probably had gotten pretty old for Noah, his wife, his children, and all those animals inside the ark. The sea can be a lonely place, and they had been inside the ark for approximately a year.

I wonder if Noah ever doubted during that time: Was this a good idea? Is this really what I should have done? He hadn’t heard anything from the Lord. Did he wonder whether God had really spoken to him?

But I love how Genesis 8 begins: “Then God remembered Noah. . . .” This isn’t implying that God had forgotten about him. Rather, it is using our language to help us get a picture of God. The Lord didn’t forget about Noah, and the Lord doesn’t forget about us, either.

Sometimes He works in a dramatic way in our lives. And sometimes months or years go by, and nothing dramatic happens. You’re just living the Christian life by faith. You wonder, Is God even paying attention anymore? He is. And you know what? You just need to do the last thing He told you to do and be faithful there.

Remember this: God always finishes what He starts. That is why He is called the author and finisher of our faith. Philippians 1:6 says, “Being confident of this. He who began a good work in you will carry it to completion unto the day of Jesus Christ.”

You just hold your course. Maybe you have felt a call to ministry, and there hasn’t been a lot of fruit in your ministry. Just hold your course. Just carry on. Keep doing what God has told you to do.

Who then is Paul, and who is Apollos, but ministers through whom you believed, as the Lord gave to each one? I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the increase. —1 Corinthians 3:5–6

George Smith thought his ministry was a failure. He felt called to Africa, but he was only there for a short time as a missionary when he was driven from the country. He left behind one convert, a woman. Not long after that, George Smith died on his knees, praying for Africa.

Some years later, a group of men stumbled onto the place in Africa where George Smith had ministered. They found a copy of the Scriptures he had left behind, and they met the one convert of his ministry, who led them to the Lord. Later a missions organization did a study and determined that 100 years after George Smith left Africa, 13,000 people had come to faith through his ministry as one person reached another, who reached another, and so on.

The Bible calls Noah “a preacher of righteousness” (see 2 Peter 2:5), yet he lived for 120 years without ever seeing a single convert. He stands as an example of all those faithful witnesses out there who don’t see a lot of results.

Are you one of those people? Maybe you have been talking to your family for years, and not one has come to believe in Jesus. Maybe you have shared your faith with your neighbors and coworkers but have never had anyone believe as a result of your testimony. You feel that you’re the worst evangelist of all time.

But it isn’t over until it’s over. Your job is to be faithful. Your job is to do your part and leave the results in the hands of God. When we stand before the Lord one day, it isn’t going to be about quantity; it is going to be about why and if you were faithful to do what the Lord set before you to do.

Temptation comes from our own desires, which entice us and drag us away. These desires give birth to sinful actions. And when sin is allowed to grow, it gives birth to death.—James 1:14–15

I don’t know why people become perplexed as to why they fall into sin when they hang around places where they are vulnerable. Let’s say that someone is struggling with drinking and then suddenly falls off the wagon, so to speak. So a friend asks, “Where were you?”

“Well, I was at a bar.”

“Why would you go hang out in a bar when you have a problem with this?”

“Well, they have a nice big-screen TV. I really like to watch the game there, and they also have the best chicken wings ever.”

People will put themselves in a place of vulnerability and then are shocked when they fall.

That is how it started for Eve when she ate from the only tree that God had forbidden. She was at the wrong place at the wrong time, listening to the wrong voice, which led her to do the wrong thing.

Eve had access to all of the Garden of Eden to discover and enjoy it. But where was she? She was hanging around in the one place God told her to stay away from. Genesis 3:6 tells us, “So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree desirable to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate. She also gave to her husband with her, and he ate” (NKJV).

As you look at that verse, it is a foundational statement about the origin of all temptation. As Christians, we basically have three enemies that we face on a daily basis: the world, the flesh, and the Devil. The world, with its allure, is the external foe. The flesh, with its evil desires, is the internal foe. The Devil, with his enticements, is the infernal foe.

For the world offers only a craving for physical pleasure, a craving for everything we see, and pride in our achievements and possessions. These are not from the Father, but are from this world.—1 John 2:16

I read a news story awhile ago about a man who was hitchhiking across the county to write a memoir he planned to call The Kindness of America. He wanted to write about his adventures and the wonderful strangers who had reached out to him along the way. But while he was eating his lunch alongside U.S. Highway 2 in Montana, he was shot in the arm during a random drive-by attack. So much for the kindness of America.

It just goes to show that people are not basically good, as some would assert. If you believe that people are basically good, then you have more faith than I do. Because if history shows us nothing else, it shows us that people are basically bad.

Why is mankind the way it is? Why do we do the things we do? Why are we always fighting and warring and having conflict after conflict?

We read in 1 John 2:15–16, “Do not love this world nor the things it offers you, for when you love the world, you do not have the love of the Father in you. For the world offers only a craving for physical pleasure, a craving for everything we see, and pride in our achievements and possessions. These are not from the Father, but are from this world.”

We like to blame the Devil for everything and say, “The Devil made me do it.” Yes, the Devil can tempt you, but he needs cooperation. He needs to work with you, and you need to work with him.

The sinful things we do have nothing to do with logic; it’s just our nature to do them. It comes from within. And the faster we recognize we have a sinful nature, the better equipped we’ll be to fight temptation.

Therefore, to him who knows to do good and does not do it, to him it is sin.—James 4:17

If someone on his deathbed was giving his final words, would you pay attention? I hope so. If someone wrote down her last wishes in a will, would you take the time to read it? I think you would.

In Matthew 28 we have Jesus’ final will and testament, so to speak, which is known as the Great Commission. Jesus said, “All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth. Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age” (Matthew 28:18–20).

This is the message of Christ to each of us. But how many of us are actually doing it? Some might find the following statement a bit controversial, but I think it is true: if you are not seeking to fulfill the Great Commission, it actually can be a sin.

There are different kinds of sin identified in the Bible: the sins of commission and the sins of omission. A sin of commission is doing what you should not do. A sin of omission is not doing what you should do.

The Bible tells us in James 4:17, “To him who knows to do good and does not do it, to him it is sin.” Yet for many, the Great Commission has become the Great Omission. Research has shown that 95 percent of Christians have never led another person to Christ.

The full concept of going into the world and making disciples is to share your faith, lead people to Christ, and then, to the best of your ability, help them mature spiritually.