Unpredictable

God shows us Himself by being unpredictable.  How much more can we accomplish in His Name by being unpredictable too. 

When I think about the word unpredictable, it often brings to mind many of the stories in the Bible about how God worked.  God doesn’t do things the way we would.  He often used the most unorthodox methods to get his point across or to show us His majesty.

One of the best examples of this was in John 4.  This is the story of the Samaritan woman at the well.  She went to draw water from the well and Jesus was sitting at the well and asked her to draw water for Him.  The irony of this is that Jews were not allowed to have dealings with Samaritans.  So you have Jesus the Son of God actually having a conversation with a Samaritan woman in a public place in the middle of town.

In another unpredictable move, God spoke through a donkey to Balaam.  If we realize who God really is we will understand that he was and is unpredictable.  When we understand this we can then begin to understand that God wants us to be unpredictable too. 

It means that we must learn to do the unexpected.  We are God’s tool to show others Him.  To be the best we can be for His Kingdom we must do the unpredictable.  If someone hurts us the most unpredictable thing we can do is to forgive the person.  What does that show the other person?  It show them a small glimpse of our Heavenly Father. 

There are small things that each of us can do to be unpredictable for Christ.  Recently I was standing in line at the grocery store and there were two young teenagers that came up behind me in line.  I had twenty or thirty items already on the checkout counter.  The teenagers had two items.  I asked them if they would like to go ahead of me.  They both looked totally shocked that I would even offer to let them ahead of me in line.   Have you ever had someone do that for you in the grocery store line?  It makes you feel differently about the person doesn’t it?  It turns your impatience of waiting in line immediately to kind thoughts about the person and gratitude for letting you be first ahead of them.

It is not an accident that God wants us to put ourselves last.  The action of putting yourself last and allowing another to be first is the very basis of what God wants each of us to show others.  The unpredictability of that action can draw others to God and that is the ultimate blessing.  Are you unpredictable?     

Prayer for the Day: Heavenly Father, I praise You for giving us so many examples of how You were unpredictable with others.  That very unpredictability changed lives.  Help me to be unpredictable so that others can see You.  If it means I must be last, I thank you for that opportunity to be at the end of the line.     

Scripture: A woman of Samaria came to draw water. Jesus said to her, “Give Me a drink.”  For His disciples had gone away into the city to buy food. Then the woman of Samaria said to Him, “How is it that You, being a Jew, ask a drink from me, a Samaritan woman?” For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans.  Jesus answered and said to her, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is who says to you, ‘Give Me a drink,’ you would have asked Him, and He would have given you living water.”  The woman said to Him, “Sir, You have nothing to draw with, and the well is deep. Where then do You get that living water? Are You greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well, and drank from it himself, as well as his sons and his livestock?”  Jesus answered and said to her, “Whoever drinks of this water will thirst again, but whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him will never thirst. But the water that I shall give him will become in him a fountain of water springing up into everlasting life.”  John 4:7-14