You Get Credit for Trying

One of my favorite scenes in the whole of the Pirates of the Caribbean series takes place between Pintel and Ragetti, the two most consistent supporting characters of the Black Pearl. The exchange takes place towards the beginning of the second movie, Dead Man’s Chest. They are paddling a small boat toward an island. Pintel has hopes of “salvaging” the Black Pearl, but Ragetti refuses. Pintel is paddling while Ragetti squints his one good eye at a book. It turns out to be the Bible. 

Ragetti: "Anyways, I ain't stealing no ship."  
Pintel: "It ain't stealing. It's salvaging. And since when did you care?"  
Ragetti: "Since we're not immortal no more. We gotta take care of our immortal souls." 
Pintel (after a pause): "You know you can't read."  
Ragetti: "It's the Bible. You get credit for trying."

I love that! You know why I like it? Because I believe it. Wholeheartedly!

Pintel doesn’t. Pintel: "Pretending to read the Bible's a lie. That's a mark against... (Points up)"

Sound familiar? How often do we hear that kind of thing in church? How often do we say things like that or imply them? “You’re not doing it right, so God isn’t going to like it.” Maybe God isn’t going to like you either. 

I definitely think God would rather have us try and not get it quite right than to not try at all. 

We don’t know much at all about planting churches, and we especially don’t know anything about planting them in Southeast Asia. We’re like the one-eye man squinting at a manual we can’t read, trying to make sense out of it. But that isn’t going to stop us from trying. And we believe that God is going to give us credit for trying, and pick up our slack. 

This coming Sunday is Easter. Worldwide there are two billion people who won’t celebrate Easter because they know nothing about it. In the Isaan region, 1 out of every 634 people is Christian. In Ubon city, it’s 1 out of 814. We want to plant a few house churches, lead some Bible Studies, Disciple new believers. We want to try. 

“Thus I make it my ambition to proclaim the Good News not where Christ has already been named, so that I do not build on someone else’s foundation, but as it is written, ‘Those who have never been told of him shall see, and those who have never heard of him shall understand.’” ~ Romans 15:20-21. That’s our goal; will you help us get there?