Paula joined my small group, and I had a chance to show her that the Higher Power she experienced healing her was the God Jesus revealed—there aren’t other gods who do that! She came to faith and started following Christ.
Paula works doing developmental home therapy with kids. One of Paula’s clients was a four-year-old named Luke, who had nearly died several times in the hospital due to complications at birth. He required ongoing therapy. Luke’s mother, Shelly, had become friends with Paula over the year of therapy, and one day Shelly opened up to Paula about something troubling her.
“I’m concerned about Luke,” Shelly began. “He’s been having strange dreams or imaginative ideas, but I don’t know where they could have come from.”
“What kind of strange dreams?” Paula asked.
“When I tuck him in for bed at night, he keeps telling me he wants to go and play in the fields with Jesus again. I asked him about it, and he insists that when he was in the hospital, Jesus came to get him and they would run and play in these beautiful meadows. As you know, his father’s a doctor, and Andrew thinks it’s a hallucination. I just can’t figure out where he even heard about Jesus. We have never been to church, talked about Jesus, or let him watch anything on TV about Jesus. How did he come up with Jesus?”
Realizing that God might just be at work behind the scenes, drawing this family to himself through the near-death experience of this child, Paula told Shelly what she had been learning about Jesus. God used that conversation to set Shelly and Andrew on a path of exploring faith. They started attending our church, and a year later, after learning about Jesus, they came to believe and follow him.
Where is God already at work in the lives of your co-workers, or those you live near or interact with throughout your day? Pay attention and join God in his work. Then invite people into loving community.
This excerpt is taken from Mud and the Masterpiece: Seeing Yourself and Others Through the Eyes of Jesus by John Burke. © 2013 by John Burke. Used by permission. All rights to this material are reserved. Material is not to be reproduced, scanned, copied or distributed in any printed or electronic form without written permission from Baker Publishing Group.
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