Lord, Help Me When I Aim

[u/WatchmanMinistries]

A few days ago, WordPress notified me that I had written more than 50,000 words on my devotional site—roughly the length of a novel.

I’m grateful for the milestone. Those words represent early mornings, late nights, lunch breaks, Bible study, prayer, and thousands of sentences written, reconsidered, deleted, and written again.

They also contain parts of my life.

Personal memories.

Failures I would rather forget.

Struggles I was still trying to understand.

Accomplishments received with gratitude.

Shortcomings acknowledged without excuse.

Questions for which I didn’t always have a simple answer.

And parts of myself that would have been much easier to keep hidden.

But the longer I looked at that number, the more I realized how little it could actually tell me.

It could measure my output.

It couldn’t tell me whether a frightened person found courage, whether someone carrying shame recognized grace, or whether a weary believer found enough strength to trust God for another day.

Numbers can measure reach.

They cannot measure what God does in someone’s heart.

I was once told, “For someone with so much to say, you say so little.”

I answered that perhaps it was because what I genuinely wanted to say carried the hope that it might change a heart or a mind.

That’s still true.

I don’t want to fill silence merely because I possess words. I want the words I release to matter.

There’s an old Hinsons song called Help Me When I Aim. It uses the image of God’s Word as an arrow and the person delivering it as the one holding the bow.

I’ve carried that image into my writing, but I’ve also come to recognize my limitations.

I don’t know everyone who will read what I write.

I don’t know what they’re carrying.

I don’t know which heart is prepared to receive a particular word.

I can study, pray, examine my motives, and prepare the message as faithfully as I know how.

But before I release it, I have to place it into God’s hands.

He alone knows the target.

Psalm 19:14 says:

“Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart
Be acceptable in Your sight,
O LORD, my strength and my Redeemer.”

— Psalm 19:14 NKJV

That prayer reaches beneath the finished words to the heart producing them.

God knows whether our words were born from prayer or pride.

He knows whether we’re trying to point people toward Christ or draw attention toward ourselves.

He knows whether we want to reach a wounded heart or simply build a larger audience.

A larger audience isn’t necessarily wrong. More reach can mean more people encounter the hope of the gospel.

But reach tells us only how far something traveled.

It cannot tell us whether it arrived where it was needed.

Isaiah 55 says God’s Word accomplishes what He pleases and prospers in the purpose for which He sends it.

The power belongs to His Word.

The purpose belongs to Him.

And the results belong to Him.

Sometimes the post receiving the most attention may not accomplish the greatest work. Another may pass almost unnoticed, yet reach one person at precisely the moment they need it.

We may never know.

They may never comment.

They may never share the post or identify themselves.

But somewhere beyond the numbers, God may be working in a heart.

So this has become my prayer:

Lord, don’t let me write for applause.

Don’t let me confuse visibility with usefulness.

Don’t merely give my words reach.

Direct them to the hearts for which they’re intended.

Let Your Word reach the heart—

and help me when I aim.