Chambers talks today about having God's peace in my life, and the thought comes to me that this peace is evident in my life as I understand that I am but a small bit player in the plot of God's continuing story. The story is not about me, but about Him.
An insignificant thing happened in our Wednesday morning Bible study a few weeks back. Billy was talking about something in the book of Ecclesiastes, which was our book study that day, and referred to the Christian's role in giving a witness to others about God in our lives. After several people shared how they went about this proclamation of their faith, I was prompted to share a specific experience that had stuck in my memory, a moment in the prison ministry that had impacted an inmate.
There was an isolated and, at the time, an insignificant moment on the first night of a Kairos weekend at Ware State Prison, when I simply smiled at an inmate as he came through the doors of the meeting room for the first time. No words, just a smile, but as that man spoke to the group at the closing of the weekend, he related how that first encounter, made him feel that perhaps these days, and this program, were meant for him.
I shared that story with the study group some weeks back, and this morning one of the men in the group, one that I had not even talked with in any of the prior sessions, came up to me and asked me about that prison ministry. We talked a bit about it, and then he asked if maybe he could check into it and see whether or not God might want him to work on it sometime in the future. He gave me his name and email, and I said that I would put him in touch with the leadership for the next walk, and he could check it out.
Now that is a long story to just make one point. This man, Mike, may be called by God to show His love in prison to some men. I don't know the future, of course, but he could have an important impact on the lives of one, or several, or a whole bunch of inmates. These inmates could have a God given testimony of His power in their own lives, to the community in prison, to their families and to their world when they are returned to society someday.
On the time scale of History, all of the above events are but a nanosecond, and each in its own right may be pretty insignificant. God calls a man to work in prison ministry, a smile, an inmate is confirmed, the inmate shares, years later the worker shares that man's story in a Bible study, weeks after that, a man asks about the ministry. Could that be the end of that particular story line? Sure, but it could also be continued into the future as part of the Big Story, the story of God's redemptive purposes.
I am a blip on the world's timeline, but I can still be a part of the story as I realize my role, not as the lead actor, but as a bit player, maybe even as an extra with no words.
Thank you God for letting me remember these events and for reminding me whose story it really is.
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