Won’t you be a fool for me?

 


I tend to be a person who gets tripped up with daily, normal activities.  

Tip the waitress the wrong amount and I’m a mess.

The bigger shock to me though was that He wanted me to tip that. I had a ten dollar bill in my hand and heard the prompt to get the twenty. 

So I did and it felt good to say ‘no keep it please.’ But. That was before He tricked me into tipping a hundred dollar bill. 

Now, I still can see her face, and the earnest excitement when she asked if it was what I meant. Because God is good (and quite frankly I am not,) at first I thought it was the twenty thing all over again. So I nodded and then I looked down at my wallet and realized the twenty was there on top. I almost audibly gasped and I looked back up at her as she was still looking up at the ceiling and thanking it. That was when it set in that I had just tipped this hotel restaurant waitress a hundred dollar bill. 

I’d love to say that I dove into the moment, and truthfully upon reflection, I could see that it was one of those intricately orchestrated Esther moments, but I was still dealing with my own stuff at the time.  You see I had plans for that money that involved buying more purses and boots. Dabbling in retail therapy had been my latest vice and I had no intention of stopping anytime soon. 

Later that night as I was praying about this situation- wanting God to fix it somehow by oh I don’t know - maybe someone at the hotel could just drop a hundred and I could happen upon it or some other such clever solution?

Then I heard His answer to this grand plan of mine: ‘won’t you be a fool for me?’ I sat stunned. What on earth did He mean by that?

When I was a freshman in college I went to a university in a small town and almost instantly met some kids from one of the campus ministries. Now the couple that ran this ministry were as precious as two souls could be. They were tiny elderly people and they brought out my protective nature in fierce form. One day the man was telling about how he had just been robbed. He was calm as a placid lake and seemed oddly happy about this event, because it allowed him to share Jesus with his attacker. I sat there, incredulous, when he concluded with ‘sometimes it’s best to just be a fool for Jesus.’ He was emphasizing his point of this by telling how he made the robber let him pray for him but also made sure the guy got his spare twenty he kept in his shoe. 

So I sat there on the edge of my clean, white hotel bed and I shook my head and smiled. ‘OK Lord, I’ll be a fool for you.’ And then I forgot about it. It wasn’t until I was shopping that I remembered why I was short a hundred. I smiled again, because, let’s be honest I didn’t really need another pair of boots and a purse. I often wonder about that lady though, and if her part of this was just as intricate. By that I mean if she like owed exactly a hundred dollars to someone or something. One of my dear friends often says that our God is efficient with His good works. 

So I leave you with this friend, if you get the chance to be a fool for Him- take it!

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