Making Full Use of Your Resources

Ex 4:2 Norman Geisler, as a child, went to a VBS because he was invited by some neighbor children. He went back to the same church for Sunday School classes for 400 Sundays. Each week he was faithfully picked up by a bus driver. Week after week he attended church, but never made a commitment to Christ. Finally, during his senior year in High School, after being picked up for church over 400 times, he did commit his life to Christ. What if that bus driver had given up on Geisler at 395?

What if the bus driver had said, “This kid is going nowhere spiritually, why waste any more time on him?”

God Came Near, Max Lucado, Multnomah Press, 1987, p. 133

I can almost hear the conversation between God and Moses, when God told him to go to Egypt and lead the people out, “But Lord, What can I do, they won’t believe me, why I doubt they’ll even listen to me.” God says, “What are you holding on to, what do you have in your hands?” “Just this rod, Lord, I use it with these sheep,” Replies Moses

1. That little rod was more useful than all the training Moses received in Egypt

1. It was used for nearly all the miracles he performed

2. It’s not what great tools you have it’s how you use the tools you have

3. God’s strength is made perfect in weakness.

A. David Gibb’s tells that The Gibbs home was centered around God and church. He goes on to tell his mother one morning for breakfast told him to go get his father she didn’t feel to well. Bro. Gibbs tells how he watched his mother walk into the living room and sit down, she never walked again. It wasn’t too much longer that she curled up on the couch and began gasping for breath, polio had struck at the Gibbs home. It was two years before he seen her again. When she was finally released from the hospital. The first night they had devotions. They all had prayer request. David’s mother’s request was that the Lord would give her something to do for him anything. That was her request every night. This was a lady that was strapped to a wheel chair couldn’t feed herself, yet wanted to do what she could for God.

The pastor came and when he heard her request he said “Sis. Gibbs you need to get this thru your head God is thru with you.” She was finally given a Sunday school class that was a mess there was no regular kids coming. But she took it, Every day she had them get her up dress her and put her in front of the mirror and for an hour she would practice her lesson. Sunday comes go to the class and there was not a single child there. She had the class anyway with her two children. About a month later it was bothering her that the children weren’t coming so she prayed and thought about it and finally told David that she wanted him to taker her downtown to the bus station so they could giver her a bus to pick up some children. Of course they told her they don’t give their busses away. They went to the station anyway and went up to the receptionist who asked, “What can we do for you” Sis. Gibbs said, “I came so you can give us a bus” I don’t think we do that hear but let me call someone. So she calls the vice-president down she explained the situation the man looked at her real sympathetically and said, “I’m sorry maam we don’t do that here” She looked at him this woman in a wheel chair and said can I ask you something, “ do the busses belong to you”

Can I talk to the owner. The owner comes and she explains the situation. He tells her the same thing we don’t give busses away here, Sis Gibbs, who is strapped in this wheelchair, says, “Before I leave can I ask you another question , “ One day when you stand before God He’s going to be awfully upset that you didn’t give me a bus” She said “you could help me make a difference in kids for eternity” He said “What about a driver,” Finally he said, “Okay lady, I’ll give you one buss and one driver for One Sunday. That’s all” She looked at the owner and said Thank you but I was really supposed to ask for three. So I need three buses and three drivers. He said okay but you better be sure that God hears about this.“ On the way home Attorney Gibbs looked at his mom and said, “I can’t believe you got busses for Sunday,” She cut him off and answered, “I didn’t do it, I can’t even dress myself, I have to be pushed every where I go, but I serve a God who can mold people and use what he mold them into”

The bus company only gave them three buses for one Sunday because the second Sunday he gave them four within 5 years he was giving 35 busses and drivers every Sunday for over twenty years and never charged a penny. The Sunday school with no kids in it in 7 years time never had less than 5000 children ran by a lady who couldn’t hold her own head up. The bus owner wrote a letter some years later stating that it was the best move he ever made in his life, Because I gave you buses my whole family is saved and on t heir way to heaven because my kids rode your buses. Almost all of my buss drivers are now saved because a lady in a wheel chair wouldn’t let them set on a bus. Every Sunday David would push her from bus to bus and she would tell the drivers put out your cigarette and come inside.

A lady stricken by polio but using what she had in her hands for God. What are you holding on to