Thoughts from Mark "Hat" Rackley

And a woman was there who had been subject to bleeding for twelve years. She had suffered a great deal under the care of many doctors and had spent all she had, yet instead of getting better she grew worse. When she heard about Jesus, she came up behind him in the crowd and touched his cloak, because she thought, “If I just touch his clothes, I will be healed.” Immediately her bleeding stopped and she felt in her body that she was freed from her suffering.

• Mark 5:25-29

“I could understand that feeling of having a place—of belonging. I was often afraid as a small child. Sleeping beside my sister, Nollie, who was a year and a half older than me, I begged to be able to hold her hand at night. She refused, and instead gave me the hem of her nightgown. By and by she did not even like me holding on to that, but told me to hold on to the hem of my doll’s nightgown.
“Then, when I was five years old, the Lord Jesus became a great reality to me. My mother told me how He loved little children and was even willing to live in my heart if I asked Him in. I did, and a feeling of peace and security took the place of the fear I had so often felt. From then on I could go to sleep at night and not be afraid.
“As a child I prayed a nursery rhyme:
Ik ga slapen, ik ben moe;
’k Sluit mijn oogjes beiden toe.
Heere, houd ook deze nacht
Weder over mij de wacht.

(I’m’ going to sleep, I am tired;
I close both my little eyes.
Lord, watch over me again
The whole night long.) ‘
“In all these years that I have been a ‘Tramp for the Lord,’ I have often been afraid. But in those moments I have always reached up and touched the hem of Jesus’ garment. He has never failed to wrap me close to Him. Yet, I still long for that time when I shall have a mansion in heaven.”

• Corrie ten Boom, Tramp for the Lord

At this point, we are halfway through the book, and we finally see that this dynamo for Jesus once had fear.  She was going anywhere the Lord directed her to go.  She went into prisons in horrid conditions.  Yet, before she was five-years-old, she was afraid, either of going to sleep or the dark.

Why did she put this at the halfway point in her book?  To let you know she was human.

We do not have to be perfect to do great things for God, or sometimes ordinary things.  We must be willing to say, “Yes” when God calls us.

God can provide the courage.  God is there, whether we feel His presence or not.  We must believe and trust in Him.  We may not see God, but we can spiritually reach out to take hold of the hem of His garment.  And that makes all the difference.

Lord, strengthen me.  Sometimes we think you should pick someone else.  They are so better qualified.  But You chose us.  You called us.  And You know what You are doing.  In Your name I pray.  Amen.

Soli Deo Gloria.  Only to God be the Glory.