Standing on Giants!

A wise man once said, "great men stand on the shoulders of giants." Don't ask me who that wise man was because I couldn't tell ya, but one of my good buddies at school shared this with me when I first got to Taylor as a young freshmen and it's really stuck with me ever since. I love this quote because I love to read and I really see the value in reading. It gives people the capability to walk in others' shoes and see many different perspectives. I've seen the truth in this quote lived out in guys' lives like Jay Kesler and the men of Crossroads. They are all very well read and what I would consider to be great men. It saddens me to read statistics like 80% of Americans last year neither bought nor read a book. No wonder our nation is in the state that it is in. Anyways that's my rant on reading. Thanks for listening. Tonight this quote took on a bit of a new meaning for me. I've always thought it was a reference to reading, but as I sat in on Willie's small group tonight I realized that it is also applicable to Christian fellowship. I met a woman named Jane tonight who was probably in her mid 40's. Jane has five children. One is a Doctor, one is a recovering meth addict who's done time in jail and recently relapsed, and another one (her youngest) had leukemia, part of her legs mowed off by a lawn mower and suffered seizures from a peach sized tumor in her brain. Jane is also divorced. Apparently her husband loved money more than her. At Jane's last church a woman told her that none of these things would be happening to her if she would just pray more. Remind ay of Job's friends? Anyways so Jane was sharing all of this with me and she finished by saying, "Dontcha know, Satan is out to seek, kill, and destroy, but I'm not going to let a few little problems like these get in between me and God because he is so good and faithful, and I wake up everyday so thankful for what the Lord has done for me and all that he has blessed me with." Wow! So now I'm on the verge of tears and astounded at this woman's faith. Jesus talked about the faith of a mustard seed can move mountains and I always thought He was referring to literal mountains, but as I listened to Jane I realized that she had, with her soy-bean-seed-sized faith, cleared her path to God by moving some serious mountains like a divorce, wayward children, and leukemia. I know that this internship was supposed to teach me the methodology of planting churches and I am learning a lot in that area, but more so than that God is helping me climb on giants' shoulders. My faith, trust, and confidence in Christ is growing stronger daily via Christian fellowship. C.S. Lewis, Eugene Peterson, Thomas Kempis, A.W. Tozer and the other great authors and spiritual giants are no longer the only shoulders that I want to stand on. God has allowed me to come and see bits and pieces of His Kingdom being worked out and it's awesome. I commented a little bit of this to Willie and he said really that's all you need to plant churches, strong faith. Maybe God is preparing me for something like this?