What does it mean to “think souls”?

It means putting on your God-tinted glasses and seeing people as God does. It means looking at a cemetery and realizing that each headstone represents a soul whose eternal destiny is sealed. Christ said that most do not find the way to Heaven.

Do you mourn for those souls who are lost as God does?

To “think souls” means to see each person who goes by as someone who is not just going to the post office or the grocery store, but as someone who is stopping off on their way to either Hell or Heaven.

To think souls is to recognize that your children are not truly your own, but are souls entrusted to you for training.

To think souls is to see beyond the externals of clothes, worldly status, hair color, skin color, eye color… even to see beyond personality, character traits, preferences and philosophies. It is to recognize that beneath all of that is a soul. A soul who God saw fit to seek to save. A soul for whom God sent His Son away from Heavenly realms into the darkness of a world who would not recognize its own Maker. Into the depths of a creation who so disowned its Progenitor that it would hate, humiliate, beat, scorn and kill the very One who breathed life into it.

To think souls is to understand that even though God knew this would happen, He so valued the soul of the one beside you that He sent His Son anyway.

To think souls is to put aside your so-called “comfort zone” and journey, as did the Savior of mankind, into the dark world where you may be rejected in order to save it.

It is to pray for others.

It is to ask for the study you know must be done in order to teach.

It is to lend a hand to the brother who stumbles.

It is to give courage to the sister who finds herself distraught.

It is to seek.

It is to care.

It is to teach.

It is to strengthen the weak.

It is to put your priorities in order not according to your own whim, but according to the will of the Father so that you may be one who creates peace between God and His creation.

It is to count trials as joy knowing that it will result in a stronger self that you may better share the power of God.

It is to not only reject sin, but to hate it for what it does to the soul God so cherishes.

To think souls is to study that you may share, study that you may better reflect the glories of God.

To think souls is to pray without ceasing, to rejoice even in persecution because through it you grow closer to the Savior.

To think souls is necessary.

…

To think souls is what we are called to do.

Note: “Think Souls” is a campaign, a movement the Bear Valley church of Christ has begun. With an emphasis on seeing others as God does, the church can do amazing things. The elders of Bear Valley have seen fit to call their congregation to action. The same call rings throughout the New Testament to all Christians. Will you answer the call?

By Erynn Sprouse
Erynn and her husband, Jeremy, have been serving with the West Side church of Christ in Muskogee, OK since 2007. Her husband is the pulpit minister and evangelist. Erynn is a stay-at-home, homeschooling mom to their four boys (Jaden, 5; Isaiah, 3; Isaac, 3; Ean, 9 months). They are 2003 graduates of the Bear Valley Bible Institute of Denver.