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To
Everything There is a Season: . A Time to Weep, A Time to
Laugh.
Ecclesiastes 3
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God Works in Mysterious
Ways
It was an
unusually cold day for the month of May. Spring had arrived and
everything was alive with color. But a cold front from the North had
brought winter's chill back to Indiana. I sat, with two friends, in the
picture window of a quaint restaurant just off the corner of the
towns-square. The food and the company were both especially good that
day.
As we talked, my attention was drawn outside, across the street. There,
walking into town, was a man who appeared to be carrying all his
worldly goods on his back. He was carrying, a well-worn sign that read,
"I will work for food." My heart sank. I brought him to the attention
of my friends and noticed that others around us had stopped eating to
focus on him. Heads moved in a mixture of sadness and disbelief. We
continued with our meal, but his image lingered in my mind. We finished
our meal and went our separate ways.
I had errands to do and quickly set out to accomplish them. I glanced
toward the town square, looking somewhat halfheartedly for the strange
visitor. I was fearful, knowing that seeing him again would call some
response. I drove through town and saw nothing of him. I made some
purchases at a store and got back in my car. Deep within me, the Spirit
of God kept speaking to me: "Don't go back to the office until you've
at least driven once more around the square." And so, with some
hesitancy, I headed back into town.
God Works in Mysterious
Ways (cont.)
As I turned the square's third corner, I saw him.
He was standing on the steps of the storefront church, going through
his sack. I stopped and looked, feeling both compelled to speak to him,
yet wanting to drive on. The empty parking space on the corner seemed
to be a sign from God: an invitation to park. I pulled in, got out and
approached the town's newest visitor.
"Looking for the pastor?" I asked.
"Not really," he replied, "just resting."
"Have you eaten today?"
"Oh, I ate something early this morning."
"Would you like to have lunch with me?"
"Do you have some work I could do for you?"
"No work," I replied. "I commute here to work from the city, but I
would like to take you to lunch."
"Sure," he replied with a smile.
As he began to gather his things. I asked some surface questions.
"Where you headed?"
"St. Louis."
"Where you from?"
"Oh, all over; mostly Florida."
"How long you been walking?"
"Fourteen years," came the reply. I knew I had met someone unusual. We
sat across from each other in the same restaurant I had left earlier.
His face was weathered slightly beyond his 38 years. His eyes were dark
yet clear, and he spoke with an eloquence and articulation that was
startling. He removed his jacket to reveal a bright red T-shirt that
said, "Jesus is The Never Ending Story."
God Works in Mysterious
Ways (cont.)
Then Daniel's story began to unfold. He had seen
rough times early in life. He'd made some wrong choices and reaped the
consequences. Fourteen years earlier, while backpacking across the
country, he had stopped on the beach in Daytona. He tried to hire on
with some men who were putting up a large tent and some equipment. A
concert, he thought. He was hired, but the tent would not house a
concert but revival services, and in those services he saw life more
clearly. He gave his life over to God. "Nothing's been the same since,"
he said, "I felt the Lord telling me to keep walking, and so I did,
some 14 years now."
"Ever think of stopping?" I asked.
"Oh, once in a while, when it seems to get the best of me. But God has given me this calling. I
give out Bibles. That's what's in my sack. I work to buy food and Bibles, and I give them out when His Spirit leads."
I sat amazed. My homeless friend was not homeless.
He was on a mission and lived this way by choice. The question burned
inside for a moment and then I asked: "What's it like?"
"What?"
"To walk into a town carrying all your things on your back and to show
your sign?"
"Oh, it was humiliating at first. People would stare and make comments.
Once someone tossed a piece of half-eaten bread and made a gesture that
certainly didn't make me feel welcome. But then it became humbling to
realize that God was using me to touch lives and change people's
concepts of other folks like me."
My concept was changing, too. We finished our dessert and gathered his
things. Just outside the door, he paused. He turned to me and said,
"Come Ye blessed of my Father and inherit the kingdom I've prepared for
you. For when I was hungry you gave me food, when I was thirsty you
gave me drink, a stranger and you took me in."
I felt as if we were on holy ground. "Could you use another Bible?" I
asked. He said he preferred a certain translation. It traveled well and
was not too heavy. It was also his personal favorite. "I've read
through it 14 times," he said. "I'm not sure we've got one of those,
but let's stop by our church and see." I was able to find my new friend
a Bible that would do well, and he seemed very grateful.
God Works in Mysterious
Ways (cont.)
"Where you headed from
here?"
"Well, I found this little map on the back of this amusement park
coupon."
"Are you hoping to hire on there for a while?"
"No, I just figure I should go there. I figure someone under that star
right there needs a Bible, so that's where I'm going next." He smiled,
and the warmth of his spirit radiated the sincerity of his mission.
I drove him back to the town-square where we'd met two hours earlier,
and as we drove, it started raining. We parked and unloaded his things.
"Would you sign my autograph book?" he asked. "I like to keep messages
from folks I meet."
I wrote in his little book that his commitment to his calling had
touched my life. I encouraged him to stay strong. And I left him with a
verse of scripture from Jeremiah, "I know the plans I have for you,"
declared the Lord, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you. Plans to
give you a future and a hope."
"Thanks, man," he said. "I know we just met and we're really just
strangers, but I love you."
"I know," I said, "I love you, too."
"The Lord is good."
"Yes, He is. How long has it been since someone hugged you?" I asked.
"A long time," he replied. And so on the busy street corner in the
drizzling rain, my new friend and I embraced, and I felt deep inside
that I had been changed.
He put his things on his back, smiled his winning smile and said, "See
you in the New Jerusalem."
"I'll be there!" was my reply.
He began his journey again. He headed away with his sign dangling from
his bedroll. When you see something that makes you think of me, will
you pray for me?"
"You bet," I shouted back, "God bless."
"God bless." And that was the last I saw of him. Late that evening as I
left my office, the wind blew strong. The cold front had settled hard
upon the town. I bundled up and hurried to my car. As I sat back and
reached for the emergency brake, I saw them, a pair of well-worn brown
work gloves neatly laid over the length of the handle. I picked them up
and thought of my friend and wondered if his hands would stay warm that
night without them. I remembered his words: "If you see something that
makes you think of me, will you pray for me?"
Today his gloves lie on my desk in my office. They help me to see the
world and its people in a new way, and they help me remember those two
hours with my unique friend and to pray for his ministry. "See you in
the New Jerusalem," he said.
Yes, Daniel, I know I will...
# # #
Return HOME from God
Works in Mysterious Ways
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