"The Least Likely to be True"
Do you have one of those friends who tell you the most impossible stories to be true? You know the ones, they are a little "odd" or "carried away". It seems like every little thing that happens, they see a "sign" or a "wonder".
The only wonder you get when you listen to them is; What were they smoking? Only they don't smoke.
Sometimes our experiences with God are like that. We have some weird, wonderful, or wacky thing happen to us, then we just have to go and talk about it.
Ok, admit it. Maybe a little "bragging" about it goes on......., maybe a little exaggeration......., some stretching of the facts......, pretty soon you have a Whopper that started off as a Big Mac.
By the time you are done telling it, it's a whale of a tale thats true but a whale of a tale that's truth?
Often people read the bible and say....Wellll, of course that can't be true. It's an exaggeration. The person got carried away and added to the story. Nobody knows the facts. There are so many bibles. The "Church" edited, added, deleted, interpreted and argues about parts of it.
You Don't believe it do you?
You know;
Like who can believe Jonah got swallowed by a Whale?
How do you know there was a flood? What about Mount Everest?
NO WAY Mary was Virgin.
How do you know there is a God?
The list goes on doesn't it?
Even worse is when people take stories from the bible and say things like:
It really wasn't a miracle. They walked on a lake bed, salt flats, sudden wind storm.
NO WAY you get all those animals on a boat, it's a legend.
Jesus didn't rise from the dead, His disciples smuggled out his body and made up the story.
You know, they have a point, in a way.
When we take a story and embellish it; like a testimony of what God has done. We may feel very passionate about it and relish in the good old days too much, or make that sin bigger than it was. Perhaps add some juicy nugget that isn't quite the truth, but it isn't really a fact either. We mean well, but if someone else was there, would they see it the same way?
When we exaggerate......... it makes it hard for a person to believe in the Truth.
We all like campfire stories in the woods. When you want to tell a scary tale and you make it sound worse than it is so the imagination of the person listening really gets them to make the story spookier. Then if the circumstances are right, a screech owl lets loose and everyone runs off scared.
God doesn't exaggerate. He doesn't have to.
God doesn't lie. He's not a man that he should.
God is .........well..........., God,and that means what he says goes.
He says what he means, and means what he says.
His Yes is yes and His No is No and he doesn't exaggerate.
He doesn't have to. What He does Himself is pretty incredible.
And I know what you are thinking. Ok, here it comes, God made the Universe and God made you and me, and that is Incredible. Right?
Well, yes it is. And he did do all those things, but I wasn't around for that. But I can tell you I was one of those people, (and in some ways still am), who when you tell me some "weird, wonderful and wacky" story, I think you are exaggerating.
I know people do. So when you tell me something, I probably will smile and wait awhile to check it out later before I go for the gusto and say AMEN or WOO HOO. I mean, people do exaggerate about God.
So for me and now for you, I am going to tell you "The least likely to be true", (laughing) because only God could do this to me and make me as the last person to be telling this personal experience.
I had been attending Calvary Chapel of Costa Mesa about 35 years ago and working at a 7-11 not far away. I lived with three Christian Roomates. I went to CC everyday because when it wasn't for a bible study, there were always volunteer opportunities to do things and most of the time I worked at the Tape Lending Library there.
My world was full of Jesus and gifts of the Spirit and you name it. (because of Romaine's study) I figured God and I could do it, so I would try it. I was radical and very very.......lonely.
All my friends were becoming big names, with big dreams and big ministries. Sometimes I worked beside them helping as I could. They often moved on, I was left behind where God seemingly left me. Two years approx and finally one day I was frustrated:
I left a service mad at God and frankly walking very fast and very determined. I kept venting on the sidewalk:
God everyone has a place. Everyone has a ministry. You made me, Why? You gave me all this study time, What for? Why are you doing all this with everyone else and you leave me alone? OH sure I get blessed, OH sure I have the High and Low times and Yes I know what you might say, Wait, but God, I am tired of this.
Everywhere I go and everyone I meet is Saved. Lets go home to heaven if this is all there is. I've had it, What about me? I've denied myself, I am alone. I have given up everything. All this is too good to be true and too much to be real, yes, but so what if you love me....you have to...you're God.
I don't have to exaggerate "my feelings" I am that real, and that passionate. But as most of you know, God just listened till I got to the 7-11.
At the store where I was Asst. Manager, I had been venting the last few weeks on a co-worker gal friend, sister-in the Lord. So, Yep, I gave her what I had been telling God and I know she had heard before. She listened glad for the distraction because most often she sat reading a magazine, her work done and slow day.
As I talked the phone rang. It was around the corner in the back and she went to answer it. She came back right away and said it was for me. Since I was Asst. Manager I figured it was my boss Amad Reyad asking me to work or cover a shift.
I picked up the phone:
"Michael" the voice on the line said.
"Yes"
"This is Jesus."
"Do you believe me? "
My stomach feel to the floor and my defense mechanisms went into overdrive. Time slowed down as I had been till this moment able to pray inside myself when some 'strange' thing was occurring. Sometimes in tongues and sometimes in my mind calling on scriptures, or the Lord, or just saying help Lord. I could always depend on God in me.
Not this time.I went numb. I couldn't " feel" that familiar 'discernment'. I didn't have the comforting 'presence' I so counted on everyday since I got saved. There was nothing inside me, I felt, hollow.I felt empty of all and I wanted to say NO as my mind screamed this is a crank phone call.
My mouth said,
"...ahhh yes." Weakly.
"There is a place for you in my Kingdom"
I nearly fainted, I don't know anything else, I know something was and I have no recollection of it no matter how hard I try. I only know when the voice was done speaking. The phone line went dead.
The person hung up.
No crank request or anything else. There is a place for you in my Kingdom
I walked back out and my fellow worker looked horrified as she told me later I was ashen faced and a look she had never seen me have. "WHAT HAPPENED?"
I told here, and when I got to There is a place for you in my Kingdom.
She cried.
She knew.
So did I.
It was the least likely to be true but since it happened to me, I can't deny it.
Today God wants to meet with you,
somehow, someway, someday.
And when you least expect it,
The least likely to be true,
will happen to you...Jesus is like that.
