We’ve spent the last two issues in this series talking about how we must focus on spiritual things in these biblically predicted perilous times of the last days. In particularly, we’ve talked about focusing on our relationship with Christ in the here and now and about focusing on our being rewarded by Christ in the hereafter. In this issue, we will turn our attention to focusing on small things.

The Bible predicts an incredible “increase” in “knowledge” at the end of time (Daniel 12:4). Knowledge is increasing today at such a phenomenal speed that it doubles every other year. There is more knowledge posted on the Internet in every 48 hours than was recorded from the beginning of history till the year 2003. Your cellphone not only gives you access to more information than is stored in the Library of Congress, but it also has more computing capacity than the Apollo 13 spacecraft.

In this incredible information age, events occurring on the other side of the world can be communicated to us on our cellphones in an instant. It is as though we hold the whole world in the palm of our hand. As a result, we not only feel enabled to interface with the whole world, but empowered to impact the whole world as well.

Despite the grandiose potential we perceive ourselves to possess in today’s high tech Information Age, the actual sphere of influence for the average person is a small place consisting of a few people. It is pretty much confined to our home, church, workplace, and neighborhood. It is pretty much restricted to our family, friends, and acquaintances.

Rather than taking in the whole world—25,000 miles around—our life really boils down to this place, this time, and the people immediately around us right here and now. It’s important, therefore, that we understand this and cut the world down to our size. Otherwise, we’ll be constantly disappointed by our failure to influence and change the whole world.

A few Sundays ago, I preached a sermon entitled, The Feminazis of Planned Parenthood, in which I addressed “the American Holocaust,” the 57 million abortions performed in this country since our Supreme Court’s infamous Roe v. Wade Decision in 1973. Afterward, in the atrium of our church, two women shared stories with me of how they had personally intervened to help prevent a threatened abortion in their immediate families. Afterward, these two women shared how they had raised or helped to raise the saved child, who today is living a life that is both honoring to Christ and glorifying to God. 

The truth is; neither of these two ladies could have prevented the millions of abortions that have been performed in our world. What they could do and did, however, was step in and prevent an abortion from being performed in their own personal world. Likewise, you and I cannot stop worldwide abortions. What we can do, however, is attempt to save children from abortions in our own personal world, as well as personally do whatever it takes afterward to help raise these saved children into Christian adults who will live Christian lives that are glorifying to God.

So often today Christians get caught up in some grandiose scheme to change the whole world. Unfortunately, by doing so, we overlook the real potential God has afforded us to personally make some change in the world. We often make the tragic mistake of overlooking the earthlings God could use us to change by straining to see a way to change the whole earth. 

In order for the church of Jesus Christ to change the world, each Christian must focus on the little change in the world Christ can use him/her to make. If each Christian did this, then, and only then, could Christ use us all to change the world Himself. On the other hand, as long as we’re trying to do by ourselves what only Christ can do through us all the world will never be changed. 

An old man noticed a small boy walking along the seashore one morning throwing starfish back into the sea. Hundreds of starfish had been washed up on the shore by a storm the night before. The man approached the boy and asked what good he thought he was really doing since there was no way in the world he could possibly save all the starfish that had washed up on the shore. In response, while picking up another starfish and throwing it back into the sea, the boy said, “I just made all the difference in the world to that one right there.”

The question for you to ask yourself is not how you can win the world to Christ. Obviously, you can’t. The question for you to ask yourself is who in your personal world could Christ use you to win to Himself. Stop looking for a way to make a difference in the whole wide world and start looking for people in your daily life for whom Christ could use you to make all the difference in the world.