The Substitutes
I want to share a true life story with you which happened some time last year. I’m sure you must have heard of the popular story of a man called Elijah who felt threatened by Jezebel and had to run for his dear life. His excuse to God was that he was all that was left of God’s prophets. I can imagine the shock in his face when God replied him; “there are 7,000 prophets who have not bowed to Baal”. This is probably one of the most challenging stories recorded in the Bible. It makes one realize that no man irrespective of his or her importance cannot be replaced. I have heard someone refer to this as having a ” better neighbor”. No man can claim to be the only one capable of doing something regardless of how big or small such a task is. This story actually happened to me.
My Pastor declared a week long program in church to give God praise for all that He had done for us and what He was still going to do. The program was to start on Monday by 6:45am which sounded too early to me. I have always encouraged dedication, commitment as well as keeping to time. But in this case, just like Elijah, I saw enough reasons it would not work. First of all, the weather was not favorable (it was a very cold period), secondly, the weekend was pretty stressful, thirdly, 6:45am was just too early. There was no way this was going to work out. I had already figured out the attendance of the program, I had also figured out that it will not start on time because virtually everyone will come late. These were my thoughts and I must tell you, my conclusions as well. In my seeming right observations and deductions, I had no idea how wrong I was. I left my house at around 7am, looking forward to seeing how right I was. On getting to the church, I was taken aback at what I saw. To say I was flabaggasted is an understatement. I was so embarrassed by the surprise I met in church that I walked into the church ashamed of myself. It then dawned on me that God will do His work with or without me… I met about 20 people in church, many of which I never imagined will be able to make that sacrifice. That number might sound small to you but you need to know the number of people I had in mind… Trying to explain how I felt after this will be close to impossible but I learned a valuable lesson for my life: “Do not be weary in well-doing, the moment you think you are the only one doing it and you stop, someone else will take your place”.
I remember the words of Jesus, ” if you refuse to praise God, He will raise up stones to praise Him”. I realised that God is never out of options when it comes to something that He is involved with.
I am pretty sure you have also fallen once or twice into the temptation of thinking you are the only one doing something, you are the only one sacrificing, you are the only one doing what is right, you are the only one saying the truth, you are the only one getting to work before time, you are the only one listening, you are the only one not cheating, etc. Well, my simple advice to you is, keep being the only one doing all those things, you might be surprised who is watching you… He that sees in secret will reward you openly. The moment you give in to the temptation of giving up, someone will take your place, taking your rewards in the process…
In conclusion, stand firm where you have been placed till the end. See you some other time…
