I haven’t posted anything on this blog since March. More on that subject later. For now I want to wrap up what originally was intended to be a series of posts on the subject of “Key People.” If you go back and see the previous posts. You will find that I was in a hardware store once and that I brought a key that I wanted to get copied.
As the man set out to make the copy, be began to give me a tutorial on the process. He said , “Now the first step is to present a blank.” He then took a blank key from the little carousel.
“Now you’ll notice that this looks like a real key but it is useless in that there are no teeth in it. He then went on to take my key and the blank and to screw them onto the machine. “Make sure that the blank is locked in for the entire process or else the key will be ruined.”
Next he said, “Now people say it wrong, keys are not made…they are CUT. Everything that cut this one will now cut the copy”. By now an entire series of messages was forming in my mind.
After the cutting was done, the man said, “Now you can’t pick this up yet because there are sharp edges that will cut you worse than a paper cut. We need to use the next step….grinding off the rough edges.“ You might want to wear eye protection”, he warned, “This is when the sparks fly!”
After the grinder he then used a buffer to finish the process. (see my last post)
“There” he crowed….”All done… Now everything that the original key could open this new one can open.” I thought of how sharing in the sufferings of Christ is part and parcel of our attempts to minister in His Name.
I remembered the account of Saul of Tarsus getting knocked to the ground and blinded before God could use Him. He was given instructions to go to a man named Ananias. This man was all too aware of Saul’s reputation as a brutal persecutor of Christians. The Lord spoke to Ananias and said, “I will show him how much he (Saul) will suffer for my Name’s sake.”
Throughout this whole encounter at the hardware store I kept thinking that realizing our potential as Key People in the Lord’s kingdom involves the same steps
- Present a blank
- Get and stay ‘locked in’ for the entire process
- There will be cutting…i.e. sharing in the sufferings of Christ
- There will be grinding and sparks will fly in order to deal with the rough edges in our lives
- There will be storms too and we will be buffeted…
- Finally, the experiences of all these processes will make us people the Lord can use.
As I took my newly cut key to the checkout, the man said one more thing.
“Do you know what we call the process?”
“No” I replied….”
“Being keyed to the master” he said.
I said I was going to come back to the subject of why I haven’t posted anything since March. I am in the process of a great ‘Reset’ in my life. I am going to go through all the comments on this site most of which have been spam…or worse. I got tired of sifting through all those replies. I am going to start fresh and invite you to join me in this ‘return to the default settings’ process.
Dr. J.