“If I could tell the world just one thing
It would be that we’re all OK
And not to worry ’cause worry is wasteful
And useless in times like theseI won’t be made useless
Won’t be idle with despair
I’ll gather myself around my faith
For light does the darkness most fearMy hands are small, I know
But they’re not yours, they are my own
But they’re not yours, they are my own
And I am never brokenPoverty stole your golden shoes
It didn’t steal your laughter
And heartache came to visit me
But I knew it wasn’t ever afterWe’ll fight, not out of spite
For someone must stand up for what’s right
‘Cause where there’s a man who has no voice
There ours shall go singingMy hands are small I know
But they’re not yours, they are my own
But they’re not yours, they are my own
And I am never brokenIn the end, only kindness matters
In the end, only kindness mattersI will get down on my knees, and I will pray
I will get down on my knees, and I will pray
I will get down on my knees, and I will prayMy hands are small, I know
But they’re not yours, they are my own
But they’re not yours, they are my own
And I am never brokenMy hands are small, I know
But they’re not yours, they are my own
But they’re not yours, they are my own
And I am never broken
We are never brokenWe are God’s eyes
God’s hands
God’s mind
We are God’s eyes
God’s hands
God’s heart
We are God’s eyes
We are God’s hands
We are God’s eyes”Hands By Jewel Kilcher
“So David prevailed over the Philistine with a sling and a stone, struck the Philistine down and killed him. Since there was no sword in David’s hand, David ran, stood over the Philistine, picked up his sword, drew it from its sheath, slew him and cut off his head with it.”
1st Book of Samuel the Prophet Chapter 17 Verse 50
I Have A Pebble And I’m Not Afraid To Use It
Around 1,100 B.C. a small group of agricultural tribes were being terrorized by a confederacy of pirates from the Greek Isles bearing the most advanced military technology the world had seen at the time. After decades of pillaging the farming families along the coast of Canaan the pirates searched the land for the most terrifying spectacle of a human being they could find. Single Combat with this monster of a champion, whom many whispered to be the offspring of demons instead of humans, would be presented to the tribes as a chance at avoiding countless loss of life in open battle. The tribes were offered to present their own champion to face this beast instead sending an entire army of farmers to die during planting season thereby leaving their families to starve in the fall. This was no Philistine charity though, the enemy wanted their future slaves in sweaty fields and not in battlefield graves.
After many weeks all the tribes could not find a single warrior to stand up to the challenger. The athletes and brawlers and manly men all shrunk back from being the one to risk failure and defeat and death no matter the chance at being the nation’s hero that slew the giant or the chance at freedom for their families.
Then one fateful day, a junior high boy that had been disqualified from every team because of his size was sent to deliver lunch to his brothers out in the field. The red haired youth was sent to the battlefield not to fight but instead to run an errand. Then he heard something he just couldn’t let slide. The vulgar beast of a man standing on the hill had been not only threatening to kill and enslave this young man’s family for several weeks along with all the other families in his tribe, he had also been insulting the ability of the young man’s God to deliver His people from these pirates and Bronze Age thugs. This young man was filled with indignation at the injustice and at the lack of willingness of the champions and heroes of his generation to stand against gross evil.
The young David didn’t see his own size or his lack of training and armor and weaponry and legacy as tickets to the gallows. He simply saw a wolf growling in his neighbor’s yard, a lion roaring at the children of his tribe, a bear trying to taking his loved ones away in the night and a lack of warriors to stand up as a wall against tyranny and fear on behalf of their people as was their duty and their birthright since Adam was tasked with killing snakes.
Wolves and lions and bears had been threats to his family and flock that he had faced down many times through the years. Courage is a tree that grows tall and thick with the opportunities for valor and honor. This young man had let the acorn of courage take deep root all through his life, now it was time for that righteous oak to provide shelter to those he loved and had loyalties for. God had on many occasions given this young man a pebble as his weapon to slay the beasts of the field and terrors of the night instead of armor and blades. This day was no different except for the fact that this thief bore a sword instead of teeth and armor instead of claws.
David walked straight up to that terror of a man that had been taunting those he loved and taunting His God. Then a boy too young to shave placed that God-given pebble directly between the blackish eyeballs of a pirate who could have played for the NBA. In a matter of a few seconds of courage, years of terror had brought to a shocking close. This was not by the manly men of the age and nor by swords and shields and war horses and armor that only the wealthy could afford. This threat of slavery was not ended by armor that was only placed on the shoulders of those who by virtue of strength, athleticism and the right last name had the confidence of the people. It was ended by a boy that nobody saw coming with a pebble from the stream and the strategy both given by His God and an intolerance for evil. The most feared army in the world was sent running back to it’s slave ships and for it’s very lives by a boy with a pebble and an awkward pre-pubescent voice and a hall pass.
The Philistines of old, just as the tyrants of today, had not yet learned to fear the unlimited power that God can bestow into any tool on the Earth in the hands of a willing warrior. In one battle God defeats a massive and terrible army with a single tent peg in the hands of a woman named Jael. In another He field commissions Gideon, the local baker, found hiding in the basement of Panera Bread to be commander of the Israelite Army. Then He has the baker turned commando smashing porcelain jugs to route the enemy instead of launching grenades and mortar shells. Aided by an enemy soldier with a strange dream of bread rolling down the hill like a grainy cannonball.
And in another era, He has a geriatric named Moses armed only with a bathrobe and a walking stick march into Pharoah’s Palace. He has been sent to wreak havoc upon the most powerful nation on Earth until it submits in shame and terror at the justice for evils it had committed upon its holy slaves. Once again, a geriatric who snuck past the nurses at the local senior center brought down the world’s premier military superpower with a walking stick.
This wouldn’t be the last time that a battle was won by a weapon or by a person anointed for the task that no one saw coming. The battles have been on different fields, the enemies have worn different kinds of weapons and armor but their strategies have always been the same; injustice, slavery, vainglory. God’s strategy has always been the same too, SURPRISE! Bet you didn’t see that one coming did you Satan?
When we go forward in History around 27 A.D. a traveling preacher named Yeshua from a town where no one finishes high school that is too small to have a Wal-mart overturns not only tables but also how humanity looks at humanity with 12 ordinary men and a few ordinary women as followers. The Way He teaches them to walk leads them to go onto establish the first hospitals, orphanages, and asylums in the world and also bring an end to slavery while granting women unprecedented human rights. He and His followers reform Judaism and completely overcome the cultures of Greece and Rome by a way of living marked by love, generosity and selflessness. He doesn’t have an army, or a fortune, a political office, a college degree, or even a Twitter Account.
He simply had the Words that God put in His mouth and a good pair of Birkenstocks.
We move onto the Middle Ages (October 1517) and a young seminary student named Martin Luther fleeing a very abusive childhood becomes disgusted at the sale of fake tickets to Heaven called Indulgences by a local preacher in the town next door. Unwilling to witness the flock being devoured by church sanctioned wolves, he takes his stand armed only with a hammer and a nail. Over the next few decades he brings over 1,000 years of papal control over Europe to its knees . Where kings and armies and fortunes had failed to rescue Europe from the burning stakes, a seminary student with a borrowed hammer and $2.00 in nails from Home Depot began the downfall of the religious tyranny of the Papacy which had the blood of millions of martyrs on its hands. Today we have freedom of religion because of a college student with a hammer and a bad haircut. This revolution was however helped along by an old man named Mr. Gutenberg with a copy machine hidden in his basement that churned out pages and pages of thoughts of freedom a century prior.
Finally in a our modern times, after centuries of ignored social and economic oppression, in 1955 an elderly black lady armed only with a bus ticket stops the nation in its tracks and demands that the Supreme Court and even the National Guard became involved in a cause everyone wished to ignore for decades. Rosa Parks didn’t have a trust fund, or a seat in congress, or a social media following. She had a job at a factory and a bus ticket. She stopped the presses and got the attention of the media and the Supreme Court in regards to the concerns of her people, by weaponizing a three inch long piece of paper with a ticket number printed on it and the use of one simple word, “No.” What millionaires and politicians and business owners and even armed rioters had been unable to accomplish, she won with a bus ticket.
The tyrants and pirates and thugs of our time are no different than in the time of the men who became King David and Rabbi Yeshua, than that of Martin Luther and Rosa Parks. They like their ancestors before them are bent on evil and domination of the meek. They have yet to learn to fear the weaponry that God chooses placed in the hands of the people He chooses, the meek, the poor, the oppressed, the underestimated.
We are also no different. If God chooses us and we cooperate with His choosing, we can turn the world on its head with the most unconventional of weapons as long as these are the weapons He assigned to us instead of the armor the Saul’s of the world try to place upon our shoulders.
He has defeated armies with tent pegs, pebbles and water jugs and even overturned empires with a good pair of Birkenstocks and a messenger committed to speaking only the Truth.
He has ended empires and centuries of oppression using a hammer and a nail,
or a copy machine and a bus pass.
We don’t need to stop and ask Saul and his mighty men in suits and ties if they think the armor the world insists on burdening us with is going to scare the giants away.
We can’t rely on professional assessments of Goliath’s anxiety levels when he sees the letters behind our names on a business card.
All we can rely on is knowing that God said its time for battle and we know in our hearts that “This is the Way”.
We need to stop and ask God if we picked the right shaped pebble or correct bus number or whatever will be the weapon for our individual battle. Then we need to ask when the battle begins and how we should face down whatever or whomever in our path has presented itself as the thief of freedom to us and those we love.
Imagine if the Apostle Paul had a minivan or if Peter had a Facebook Account?
Imagine if someone gave Andrew a cellular phone or Matthew a laptop?
Imagine if someone let John loose on a college campus
or Barnabas was locked up in a federal prison?
If we were to all make ourselves available for battle then the world’s tyrants would lie awake at night shuddering at the thought of which dismissed nobody off the street is at the city park tonight gathering pebbles to take down their corporate security team.
Or what gifted street preacher is putting on His new sandals before breakfast to change the hearts of the city they formerly controlled by lust, greed and bribery?
They would learn to fear the seminary student buying a bag of nails at Home Depot when they thought they had all the pulpits on a string.
And to toss and turn over whose fiery grandma in a pair of Dr. Scholl’s will be standing in line at the Greyhound Station tomorrow ready to resurrect the dignity of millions.
They would fear the nobody’s waiting to arise from the crowd more than they fear the rifle of the soldier marching towards their mansion or the gavel of the judge or the banker closing their account .
If you can ask God to show you your pebble and show your Goliath, or maybe point you to just the right pair of sandals, or pray for which number bus to take to work today, you would be amazed.
This keyboard is my pebble, and as of today, I am no longer afraid to use it.
What is your pebble and where is your Goliath?
“Beautiful Outlaw” Chapter 4: Fierce Intention
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