Who Is God Gonna Use?

“He came to His hometown and began teaching them in their synagogue, so that they were astonished, and said, ‘Where did this man get this wisdom and these miraculous powers? Is not this the carpenter’s son? Is not His mother called Mary, and His brothers, James and Joseph and Simon and Judas? And His sisters, are they not all with us? Where then did this man get all these things?’ And they took offense at Him. But Jesus said to them, ‘A prophet is not without honor except in his hometown and in his own household.’ And He did not do many miracles there because of their unbelief.” (Matthew 13:54-58)

As I was reading the above passage this morning, I couldn’t help but nod my head in agreement, roll my eyes and think to myself, “hoo-boy, He sure got that right!” I’ve experienced that prejudice myself on several occasions, and I know several people who have as well. We all have a hard time looking past the people who we’ve known for so long. If you have been out of school for more than 10 years, you know what I mean. You go through school with a variety of people; you graduate and go your separate ways. Then several years later, you experience the “High School Class Reunion”.

Crazy.

“Who are all of these old folks?”

“Holy cow! John is a doctor now? How’d that happen? He barely passed biology his Freshman year because Stacy broke up with him! Remember that?”

“Monica is a lawyer? Get outta town! Didn’t she get suspended her Junior year because she was caught smoking in the girls’ room?”

We tend to still think of our former classmates in terms of how they were back when we were in school with them. In our minds they’re still goofy 17 year old kids, so it’s really hard to think of them as responsible adults or knowledgeable professionals!

Same sort of thing can happen at church, and does happen at church.

I grew up in a small, rural church where everybody knew everybody. (Heck, everybody was RELATED to each other for the most part!) I loved church (still do) and was active while I was a kid. I was an acolyte for years, active in our youth group, and attended Sunday School and Sunday Worship every Sunday. It would be a natural progression to continue to be active as an adult, right? Of course! So I ended up serving on different boards and graduated from acolyte robes to assisting minister albs. One problem. Most folks still thought of me as being 9 years old. If I had an idea or a thought about something, it was as if I was a 9 year old again, who when trying to share with the “grown-ups” and was rewarded with a smile, a pat on the head and an “aw, isn’t that cute” before being dismissed. I didn’t take too much of an offense to it, I realized that it’s not easy to see someone as an adult when you used to wipe off their Kool-Aid mustaches at Bible School!

When I finally ended up at a different church, that stigma was gone. The people at the church hadn’t known me as a child; they only knew me as an adult. It was MUCH easier for them to listen to and relate to me than it was for those at the church of my childhood.

(Disclaimer: Now, just because you might be caught in that trap, doesn’t mean you must switch churches. Having strong ties to a hometown church can be wonderful. I still visit my former church on occasion. They’re good people. And…well…most of them are relatives of mine!)

I cannot blame those who couldn’t see past my past. Like I said before, we are ALL guilty of that. We need to be conscious of it, however, and not let it blind us. We might have friends and neighbors who are actively letting their light shine forth for the glory of God (to paraphrase Matthew 5:16), but we can’t see their light because we’re still wearing our dark 1980’s Ray-Bans. We should pray that God help us to be open to hearing the truth from the folks that are around us, because you never know who God is gonna use.


“And a princess pulled a baby out of the water. He was hidden in the rushes, sleeping in a basket made of reeds. And you never know who God is gonna use: a princess or a baby, or maybe even you or me!” – “Who Is God Gonna Use” by Rich Mullins (The World As Best I Remember It – Volume 1, 1991)