Several years ago, I had the opportunity to go on a 2-month long mission trip to Italy and Greece with Teen Missions International. Over the course of the summer, my team and I worked with refugees, partnered with local churches in evangelism, and shared our stories with travelers from all over the world. One day, as we were staying in the city of Florence, my team traveled to a park to do some street evangelism. We had a few songs and a skit prepared as part of a presentation, and I was asked to give a short testimony between songs.
My Teen Missions Team in Corinth, August 2014
I know I had a brief story prepared about who God was to me, but to be honest, I don’t remember at all what I had planned on saying, because of what the Lord ended up doing.
I took a step forward, and as soon as my translator Ruth put the mic in my hand, I heard the Holy Spirit say “Tell them the story of Ehud and King Eglon from Judges 3.”
If you’re not familiar with the story, it’s a strange one. Really, God? I remember thinking. That’s the story about that left handed man and the fat king. You know, the one who died, and all his servants waited outside his door because they thought he was “relieving himself”? (Seriously, if you haven’t read the story, look it up. Judges 3:12-30.) Besides, God, I haven’t read the book of Judges in ages and I hardly remember the details. But, when the Creator of the Universe tells you what to say and puts you on the spot, it’s usually best not to say no. So, I did my best and told the story.
And I butchered it like the prized fat pig (or middle-aged Moabite king, if you will). Even years later, I still have a vivid image burned into the dark corners of my memory of Ruth’s confused faces as she attempted to translate what I said, all the while I used my overly expressive eyes to communicate to her, “No, I do not have any clue what I’m doing right now.” When I had finished speaking and my team gave me that awkward slow clap, mixed with a few sympathetic smiles, I remember telling myself that I did my best to obey, and that surely there was someone out there who must have needed to hear it.
I’ve always viewed that day as one of those moments that God understands, but I definitely can’t—not in this life, at least. I never thought anything else would come from it.
Until training camp, that is. One of our main sessions as we were digging into international ministry was all about preparing sermons and preaching, and afterwards, we were given an hour to begin working on a short sermon so that we could all have something ready for the times we’d be asked to preach overseas.
I sat down and asked the Lord what he wanted me to write about, and nearly laughed out loud when I heard the words, “Hey Joel, remember that one time?” Years after that day in Florence, God led me back into the story of Ehud, and I was reminded that we serve a Father who loves to take even the confusing, embarrassing parts of our stories, and make them into something that is hopeful and beautiful. In teaching me to write a well-organized, purposeful sermon on that very same passage, he took a confusing event that made me feel like a child, and instead reassured me that I am his son, that I’m a man, and that in him, I do have a place where I know what I’m doing. It was such a small thing, but in leading me to write a sermon on this topic, the Father assured me over and over again of how incredibly proud he is of me. He really does take our greatest insufficiencies and make them into his greatest strengths.
In fact, this is exactly what this passage in Judges tells us. God took Ehud’s left-handedness—a condition that was considered a disability in ancient times, which brought shame, and even kept men from being able to go to war—and used it to bring peace to his people for eighty years. Only because Ehud was left-handed was he able to sneak a sword into King Eglon’s inner chamber, and it was precisely the strangeness of this assassination that allowed Israel to be freed from political oppression. It was his weakness alone that allowed the Lord’s strength to be seen, because the God we love delights in taking our insufficiencies and allowing his glorious light to shine through them.
(And yes, our Father does have a sense of humor).
