Jesus answered, “I assure you: Unless someone is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. Whatever is born of the flesh is flesh, and whatever is born of the Spirit is spirit.   John 3:5-6 HCSB

When you hit your target you are said to have good aim.  If you go to a firing range, you will see shooters with guns pointed down range aimed at their targets. After all the target is what they are hoping to hit, right? Aiming anywhere else is not only dangerous, but will prevent you from hitting your target.

Well, how is your aim? If you are like me, then your aim isn’t always so great.  In shooting and life, my aim sometimes tends to be a little off at times.  I would love to have the confidence of a good shooter when I go to qualify with my firearm, but I am just happy to make a qualifying score. I would love to be disciplined enough to always stick to my diet and reach my goal weight, but I fall short of that often. I often aim to do well, but I get distracted. I lose focus.

I’m happy to say that my life with Christ is a little easier thanks to His mercy and grace (Romans 3:23).  Living my life to love and serve my Lord and Savior is nothing like going to the range.  You see, going to the range makes me nervous.  I am not confident and I know that the only way I am going to make a qualifying score is with God’s help. Now, I trust Him to help me with that because I know that on my own, I can’t make it. At the range, even though I am trusting God, there is still anxiety.  I am shooting beside really good shooters. I am shooting surrounded by police officers that I am almost certain shoot better than me. And when they don’t, I feel bad for them. I remember before I retired and shooting when your job depended on it.

Aiming for eternal life is much simpler, but same concept.  I give that all over to God as well, this is another thing that I cannot possibly do on my own.  I just won’t make it if it’s up to me.  But, when I turn it all over to God, He helps me. He is there with me. He fills me with His Holy spirit and helps me to stay on target. He allows me to focus on Him while He handles everything else in my life (Matthew 6:33-34).

The thing is if you aren’t aiming at your target, you are not going to hit it.  A baseball player can’t stand on first base and hit the ball being pitched to home plate, right? That’s crazy and if a baseball player did that, he would probably be carried off the field and sent for a psychiatric evaluation. My question to you, is what are you aiming at? My hope is that you are aiming at eternal life with God in heaven. You can stay on target with His help.

My next question is are you saved? The Bible clearly tells us that we must be born again, born of the Spirit  in order to enter the kingdom of God.  Our scripture passage tells us this. Mark 16:16 tells us whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned. Your life is going to point in one of two directions.  If your aim is to go to the fiery pits of hell, that will be obvious to those around you. It will be obvious in your speech and your actions. If you are aiming to spend eternity with your Lord and Savior, that will be obvious too in the way you speak and in your actions.

I spent a time in my life when my aim for heaven was so far off that I guess you could say I was aiming for hell, but praise God, He got me straightened out and now has me on target. My aim is now much better. The beautiful thing about it is that I don’t have to follow a lot of complicated rules, I just have to love Him with all my heart, all my soul, and all my mind (Matthew 22:37-39). I have to love others as I love myself. This isn’t always easy, especially when I lose aim and get off target. This is why I must keep my focus on God which is perfect aim.

My prayer for you today is that you too have the perfect aim in your life.  When you do this, the peace and joy that you feel make it easy to keep perfect aim and stay focused on your target.

Have a great day!