The Source of Help
Sometimes we don’t learn or even see the lesson for many years. Today’s thought is one of those lessons.
When I was in high school, I was presented with a puzzle. It was one of those where people were trying to cross a river with only one boat. It was a really good puzzle and I could not solve it. I, therefore, judged it unsolvable.
All through college I challenged others with the puzzle. No one ever solved it. Later I was teaching 8th-grade school. To keep my class busy, I gave them the puzzle. Of course, I knew it was unsolvable, but wanted to challenge them to struggle with it.
About 5 minutes into the puzzle, one little girl, said, “I’ve done it.” Of course, I knew she had not, but I let her come show me. She had no chance. She came to my desk to show me. Wow! She had solved it.
I had prejudged her and decided that an 8th-grade girl could never do this.
The lesson I should have learned was that I should not prejudge. Sometimes answers come from unexpected sources.
In 1 Samuel 17, the Bible demonstrated that principle. For 40 days, King Saul and all the Israelite warriors were tormented by a giant named Goliath. For 40 days, the Hebrews had lived fearfully. No one could get the victory for Israel. Finally, a teenage boy came forward and offered to fight the giant.
The mighty King Saul, told the teenager, “You are not able to go out against this Philistine and fight him; you are only a young man, and he has been a warrior from his youth.” (v33).
Well, you know how that story ended. King Saul prejudged the youth but in the end, the youth delivered the solution by meeting and killing the giant.
King Saul almost lost the battle, because he prejudged the boy and was ready to reject the only one who could solve his problem.
I sometimes do that too, but we must not make Saul’s mistake. It is important to remember that help sometimes comes from unexpected places.
Lonnie Davis