As a young man in my twenties, I was a salesman selling food-stuffs with
a '1,000,000+ turn over. To accomplish this, I drove 40,000+ miles per
year and bought a house in Banbury, in the centre of England, so I could
get home every night. To save time during the day, I often drove during
the lunch hour and ate as I drove. I was quite successful, increasing my
area's turnover year on year. Full of the world's values, I enjoyed the
challenge.
Meanwhile, God was calling me to come nearer. One of
the ways by which He did this was through a church conference
one Saturday, led by my pastor Rev. Brian Butcher.
We had started off with
praise and worship and then an Annual General Meeting, before the main
content of the day, now long forgotten. Mid-morning, we adjourned to get
some fresh air, and I walked out into a quiet, sheltered spot. My pastor
followed me out into the fresh air. Brian was also an ecstatic prophet
as well as a pastor.
He walked up to me under the power of the
Spirit, with a word from God, for me! He spouted out today's verse,
turned around, and walked back in! I was not expecting this (one does
not), and I did not fully take it in.
God, it seems, was alive
and well, and interested enough in me to send me a word that day, even
if it was a bit obscure. That was thirty-two years ago, when I thought I
knew everything and could manage to help God out if He needed it. I have
always argued with God and tried His patience to find out the truth.
So I believe that, seeing as God was interested in me then and still
is now, He must be interested in all my readers too, because such is the
marvel of grace and the mystery of a God who desires to know each one of
us individually: strengths, weaknesses, foibles and all!
Prayer:
Lord, thank You very much for Your extreme forbearance with us. Please
forgive us our hubris (pride) and continue to draw out the good in us,
so as to quash anything that is not of You. Then we will hear Your voice
more clearly and live more according to Your purposes. In Jesus' name.
Amen.
Rod
Marshal Cheltenham, Gloucestershire, England
