Does God like to surprise us?

I think He does.

Yesterday morning, I was reading in the book of James. One of the passages I read was:

What good is it, my brothers, if a man claims to have faith but has no deeds? Can such faith save him? Suppose a brother or sister is without clothes and daily food. If one of you says to him, “Go, I wish you well; keep warm and well fed,” but does nothing about his physical needs, what good is it? In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead. (James 2:14-17)

Later in the morning, I was listening to a podcast of a sermon by Mark Driscoll. He was teaching from the parable about the unrighteous judge and the widow who kept asking for justice. The judge finally relented and gave her what she wanted because she simply wore him out with her asking.

Naturally, we will all want to identify ourselves with the widow and conclude we need to persist in our prayers, which is the point Jesus was making. But Mark first encouraged us to put ourselves in the position of the judge. Are we in a position to help someone, but are withholding our help even though it’s in our power to act?

Early yesterday afternoon, I was helping to breakdown a fireworks tent that we’d operated to raise money for Young Life in Fayetteville. As I was breaking down cardboard boxes and stacking them in my truck, a beat-up, old car pulled up to where I was working. An elderly man waved for me to come over to his car.

I’ll be honest, I was little annoyed at that point. I was tired and hot, and now some guy wanted me to stop what I was doing and come see what he wanted. He could get out and come to me, I thought. So I approached the car and stuck my head in the passenger side window. Then I saw it would have been difficult for the man to get out of the car. His seatbelt didn’t really buckle–he had sort of tied himself in with it.

The man asked me if he could help stack the boxes, because he needed money for gas. He showed me a clipboard that had a number of addresses and dates written on it. It was his list of odd jobs he’d lined up to do around town. He just didn’t have a job that day and needed to put some gas in his car.

I told him I was almost done with the boxes and didn’t have any cash. I even opened my wallet to show him all I had were some receipts and a couple of used baseball tickets from last week.

It was very hard to understand what he was saying, but he kept looking at the fuel gauge and mumbling about needing gas.

I was about to send him on his way and get back to work when…

It hit me that wishing him well and sending him off with an empty gas tank wasn’t right. It didn’t matter that I was hot and tired. It didn’t matter I felt annoyed. It was in my power to help him.

There was a Conoco gas station about 200 feet away, so I told the man to drive over there and I would use my debit card to buy him some gas. As I was walking over, I was looking for a friend of mine who had called about ten minutes earlier and said he was going to stop by.

I thought about only putting $20 worth of gas in the man’s car, but decided I would go ahead and fill his tank. The pump clicked off at $50.81.

By this time, my friend had walked over to the gas station. I explained to him the situation with the old man and then we talked as we walked back to the fireworks tent.

After several minutes, my friend pulled two checks from his pocket and handed them to me.

One was a $1,000 donation to Young Life. Surprise!

The profit from the fireworks tent was below what we’d hoped for, so that check went a long way toward making up the difference and was a great encouragement, especially to my wife, Robyn, the Young Life director in Fayetteville.

The other check was made payable to me. For $500. Surprise!

If I hadn’t read that passage in James or listened to Mark Driscoll’s sermon, would I still have put gas in that man’s car?

I don’t know. Maybe I would have allowed my annoyance to override doing the right thing.

And if I hadn’t put the gas in his car, would God have still provided that money through my friend?

Well, the checks were written and he was on his way to see me, so yes, I probably would have still been given the money. I guess God could have changed my friend’s mind, but I suspect I still would have received the checks. I just wouldn’t have received the blessing of helping an old man who needed me yesterday. And I would have kicked myself the rest of the day (and today too) and felt terrible for not being generous when God was being so generous to me.

As I was reflecting on how God must delight in surprising us with blessings the way he did for me yesterday, I wondered if it’s not so much that God is surprising us as He is just doing what He said He’d do. What we see as a surprise is God just being faithful. We’re surprised because we really don’t think He’ll do what He says.

Now I know we won’t always see God give back to us within minutes. The reaping often comes much later than the sowing. Let’s never forget though–the reaping does come. It’s not a matter of “if” God will act, it’s only a matter of “when.” God is faithful to His promises.

If we act in faith, we show that our faith is alive. And when we do, God shows up. And sometimes, He shows up with a surprise.

Is it within your power to help someone today? I mean with physical or financial needs.

Do something then. Faith without action is dead.