Brenda was a young woman who was invited to
go rock climbing. Although she was scared to
death, she went with her group to a tremendous
granite cliff. In spite of her fear, she put on the
gear, took a hold on the rope, and started up the
face of that rock.
Well, she got to a ledge where she could take a
breather. As she was hanging on there, the safety
rope snapped against Brenda's eye and knocked
out her contact lens.
Well, here she is on a rock ledge, with hundreds of
feet below her and hundreds of feet above her. Of
course, she looked and looked and looked, hoping
it had landed on the ledge, but it just wasn't there.
Here she was, far from home, her sight now
blurry. She was desperate and began to get upset,
so she prayed to the Lord to help her to find it.
When she got to the top, a friend examined her eye
and her clothing for the lens, but there was no
contact lens to be found. She sat down,
despondent, with the rest of the party waiting for
the rest of them to make it up the face of the cliff.
She looked out across range after range of
mountains, thinking of that Bible verse that says,
"The eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout
the whole earth." She thought, "Lord, You can see
all these mountains. You know every stone and
leaf, and You know exactly where my contact lens
is. Please help me.
Finally, they walked down the trail to the bottom.
At the bottom there was a new party of climbers
just starting up the face of the cliff. One of them
shouted out, "Hey, you guys! Anybody lose a
contact lens?"
Well, that would be startling enough, but you
know why the climber saw it? An ant was moving
slowly across the face of the rock, carrying it.
Brenda told me that her father is a cartoonist.
When she told him the incredible story of the ant,
the prayer, and the contact lens, he drew a picture
of an ant lugging that contact lens with the words,
"Lord, I don't know why You want me to carry
this thing. I can't eat it, and it's awfully heavy. But
if this is what You want me to do, I'll carry it for
You."
At the risk of being accused of being fatalistic, I
think it would probably do some of us good to
occasionally say, "God, I don't know why you
want me to carry this load. I can see no good in it
and it's awfully heavy. But, if you want me to
carry it, I will."
God doesn't call the qualified, He qualifies the called.
