Today is my day off (I'm supposed to take Fridays off every week - sometimes I do sometimes I don't). I’ve been preaching lately about the importance of rest and a day off so today I played golf with Brandon, Travis and Myrick (Myrick is a friend of Brandon’s). We played a pretty nice course in Huntersville called Birkdale Country Club. I didn’t play worth a hoot but it was a great day – HOT – but great. It was a very tough course with small greens. We played behind a group that included Chad Knaus (Jimmy Johnson’s crew chief).

On the first hole Travis smoked a drive right up the fairway. But on his second shot he hit a power line that was hanging over the fairway and the corner of the green. When I say “power line” I’m talking about the big, huge steel ones with about six big lines hanging on it. These things actually sneaked throughout the course. When you’re under them you can actually hear the voltage running through them. It was amazing to think of the power in them, and a little nerve-wracking at the same time.

Let me back up a little bit here. This last week has been a tough one. It really has. For example, our students are going to Daytona next week. Well, Friday morning of last week our transportation fell through. Literally, we had to pull out all the stops and get most of our staff working on the problem. Travis did a great job putting out the word and asking churches from Gastonia to Rocky Mount if we could borrow or rent their van(s) or bus. We got “no’s” for two days straight. We prayed! And we prayed! And we prayed! Finally, we had a spiritual breakthrough (yes, I believe it was a spiritual breakthrough) about 4:30 on Tuesday afternoon. Covenant Church of Harrisburg and a Parkwood Baptist Church in Rocky Mount let us borrow their vans for free! (THANKS SO MUCH). The alternative was to spend about $2,500 that we don’t have in the budget. If you were around here this week you would know what a miracle this is.

It hit me today on the golf course that God’s power is like those power lines above us. The power in those lines is distributed into homes and businesses all over the area through wires and conduit. God’s power is also available to us and is distributed to do His work – which is to build His Kingdom. Our prayers and His Word are the wires and our lives are the conduits that get it to where He needs to go. God does His Work through us. He does miracles and sends His power through us when we make our lives available to Him and demonstrate our faith in action. And this week, in more ways that just the vans, I have seen God show up and do things that only He could do – miracles.

Let me tell you something else I just feel like saying. Being used by God is not for whimps, or selfish people, or people with their own agenda, or mean people, or people who are afraid to face their fears, or people who won’t take risks, or lazy people.

More later on what it takes to make yourself available to God…