THE NIGHTSTICK OF GOD

We were living in Los Angeles and I had been invited to speak at a church in Wyoming. The independent church had been very supportive of the missionary evangelism program where I served on the leadership team and I was glad to visit them to minister and say thanks.

I flew into the little town on a commuter plane from Denver. The gracious pastor met me at the airport as I arrived late on a Saturday afternoon. I was to stay with the pastor and his family at the church parsonage and speak in three services the next day.

I knew I was in for an unusual time the moment I walked into the kitchen early Sunday morning. The pastor’s wife was fixing breakfast and when I said, “Good morning,” she smiled and greeted me. Then I glanced over and saw the pastor leaning against a counter, drinking a cup of coffee. He was dressed in a shiny black suit, clerical collar, and white patent leather cowboy boots. The thought flashed across my mind, “Now this is different!”

The morning services were excellent and I thoroughly enjoyed being there. The people were friendly and the services lively. I spoke in both morning services and was scheduled to speak in the evening service as well. Sunday night as the worship service was progressing, the pastor leaned over to me and asked, “Do you see that big guy on the second row? Remind me to tell you about him later.”

Later the pastor told me that the “big guy” was a deputy sheriff who had been a Christian for just a few months. Apparently this new believer was one of those who tried to find a Christian application for everything that happened to him. Just a few weeks prior, he and his partner had been called to a bar on the edge of town to break up a fight. By orders of the sheriff, one of the deputies was to break up the fight and the other was to stay off to the side and protect his partner from any interference.

Just a little insight about this town. It was a very western boomtown because of vast supplies of coal and oil in the area. The town was overrun with oil field workers and miners who worked the huge strip mines in the area. The workers were well paid and came into downtown to have a good time…and that often resulted in rowdy behavior.

When the two deputies walked into the bar, it was the new believer’s turn to protect his partner. The deputy waded into the fight in an attempt to separate two drunken women who were wrestling on the floor. Some of the cowboys and oil workers were enjoying the spectacle and did not like the interference of the lawman. They began to push and pull on the lawman and things began to heat up into a mini-riot.

Suddenly there was a huge shout from the newly converted deputy sheriff. He pulled his nightstick from its holder and bellowed at the top of his lungs, “With the jawbone of a donkey Samson slew a thousand Philistines and the world has yet to see what God is going to do with this nightstick!”

The whole bar fell silent as 15 to 20 drunken cowboys, oil field roughnecks and miners looked at the deputy with a certain amount of disbelief and wonderment. Even the scrappers on the floor stopped to see who would say something so outrageous, and in a moment the fighting and the near riot conditions had dissipated.

“And the world has yet to see what God is going to do with this nightstick.” There is something very simple and yet profound about that statement. Those who make the biggest statement for God are those who lay down their own agenda and allow themselves to be picked and wielded by the hand of God. In the words of Jesus, “And He said, ‘Abba, Father, all things are possible for You. Take this cup away from Me; nevertheless, not what I will, but what You will’” (Mark 14:36).

Samson’s choice of a donkey’s jawbone was a unique and unlikely choice of a weapon. When David went to battle against Goliath and chose to use a sling, again it was a unique choice and not one that we often see repeated in Scripture.

When God made us, He made each of us distinctive, one-of-a-kind and then He broke the mold. God seems to love to make something unique and then fashion it into a weapon that defies logic. “But God has chosen the foolish things of the world to put to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to put to shame the things which are mighty” (1 Corinthians 1:27).

When you come to the place where circumstances seem way beyond you and there is no logical answer, no way out, then you are very close to being in the right place for God to use you in a special and unique way. “God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble” (1 Peter 5:5).

“And the world has yet to see how God will use (insert your name here).”

Have a great week!