Thanks good friends Carol and Clay Vice. If any doesn't know or remember these two were remarkable athletes/coaches for Portsmouth Clay High School and the area. Clay played freshman basketball at Portsmouth before moving to Portsmouth Clay. He was an exceptionally good basketball player for Don Monk. Carol was an exceptional cheerleader, teacher-coach for swimming teams of youngsters including her own. Together, they coached winning girl's softball to unmatched success in Ohio. Ninety-three percent wins over 11 years exceeds even Kentucky basketball successes.
This is a Christian witness story I may have read once before, but I thank my good friends for sharing now. We need Christians who are willing to stand up for our country God has so richly blessed.
Sam
----- Original Message -----
From: Clay Vice
Sent: Saturday, October 24, 2009 8:44 AM
Subject: Fw: Beth Moore's Hairbrush Experience at an Airport
From: June
To: Clay Vice
Sent: Saturday, October 24, 2009 7:01 AM
Hairbrush Experience at an Airport
This is worth the time it takes to read! Please take a moment.
HAIRBRUSH EXPERIENCE OF BETH MOORE
AT THE AIRPORT
For those of you who do not know Beth Moore, she is an outstanding
Bible teacher, writer of Bible studies, and is a married mother of two
daughters.
This is one of her experiences:
April 20, 2005, at the Airport in Knoxville , waiting to board the
plane, I had the Bible on my lap and was very intent upon what I was
doing. I'd had a marvelous morning with the Lord. I say this because I
want to tell you it is a scary thing to have the Spirit of God really
working in you.
You could end up doing some things you never would have done otherwise.
Life in the Spirit can be dangerous for a thousand reasons, not the
least of which is your ego.
I tried to keep
from staring, but he was such a strange sight. Humped
over in a wheelchair, he was skin and bones, dressed in clothes that
obviously fit when he was at least twenty pounds heavier. His knees
protruded from his trousers, and his shoulders looked like the coat
hanger was still in his shirt.. His hands looked like tangled masses of
veins and bones.
The strangest part of him was his hair and nails. Stringy, gray hair
hung well over his shoulders and down part of his back. His fingernails
were long, clean but strangely out of place on an old man.
I looked down at my Bible as fast as I could, discomfort burning my
face. As I tried to imagine what his story might have been, I found
myself wondering if I'd just had a Howard Hughes sighting. Then, I
remembered that he was dead. So this man in the airport... an
impersonator maybe? Was a camera on us somewhere? There I sat; trying
to concentrate on the Word to keep from being concerned about a thin
slice of humanity served up on a wheelchair only a few seats from me.
All the while, my heart was growing more and more overwhelmed with a
feeling for him.
Let's admit it. Curiosity is a heap more comfortable than true concern,
and suddenly I was awash with aching emotion for this bizarre-looking
old man..
I had walked with God long enough to see the handwriting on the wall.
I've learned that when I begin to feel what God20feels, something so
contrary to my natural feelings, something dramatic is bound to happen.
And it may be embarrassing.
I immediately began to resist because I could feel God working on my
spirit and I started arguing with God in my mind. 'Oh, no, God, please,
no.' I looked up at the ceiling as if I could stare straight through it
into heaven and said, 'Don't make me witness to this man. Not right
here and now. Please. I'll do anything. Put me on the same plane, but
don't make me get up here and witness to this man in front of this
gawking audience. Please, Lord!'
There I sat in the blue vinyl chair begging His Highness, 'Please don't
make me witness to this man. Not now. I'll do it on the plane.' Then I
heard it...'I don't want you to witness to him. I want you to brush his
hair.'
The words were so clear, my heart leapt into my throat, and my thoughts
spun like a top. Do I witness to the man or brush his hair? No-brainer.
I looked straight back up at the ceiling and said, 'God, as I live and
breathe, I want you to know I am ready to witness to this man. I'm on
this Lord. I'm your girl! ;You've never seen a woman witness to a man
faster in your life. What difference does it make if his hair is a mess
if he is not redeemed? I am going to witness to this man.'
Again, as clearly as I've ever heard an audible word, God seemed to
write this statement across the wall of my mind. 'That is not what I
said, Beth. I don't want you to witness to him. I want you to go brush
his hair.'
I looked up at God and quipped, 'I don't have a hairbrush. It's in my
suitcase on the plane. How am I supposed to brush his hair without a
hairbrush?'
God was so insistent that I almost involuntarily began to walk toward
him as these thoughts came to me from God's word: 'I will thoroughly
furnish you unto all good works.' (2 Timothy 3:17)
I stumbled over to the wheelchair thinking I could use one myself. Even
as I retell this story, my pulse quickens and I feel those same
butterflies. I knelt down in front of the man and asked as demurely as
possible, 'Sir, may I have the pleasure of brushing your hair?'
He looked back at me and said, 'What did you say?'
'May I have the pleasure of brushing your hair?'
To which he responded in volume ten, 'Little lady, if you expect me to
hear you, you're going to have to talk louder than that.'
At this point, I took a deep breath and blurted out, 'SIR, MAY I HAVE
THE PLEASURE OF BRUSHING YOUR HAIR?' At which point every eye in the
place darted right at me. I was the only thing in the room looking more
peculiar than old Mr. Long Locks. Face crimson and forehead breaking
out in a sweat, I watched him look up at me with absolute shock on his
face, and say, 'If you really want to.'
Are you kidding? Of course I didn't want to. But God didn't seem
interested in my personal preference right about then. He pressed on my
heart until I could utter the words, 'Yes, sir, I would be pleased. But
I have one little problem. I don't have a hairbrush.'
'I have one in my bag,' he responded.
I went around to the back of that wheelchair, and I got on my hands and
knees and unzipped the stranger's old carry-on, hardly believing what I
was doing. I stood up and started brushing the old man's hair. It was
perfectly clean, but it was tangled and matted. I don't do many things
well, but must admit I've had notable experience untangling knotted
hair mothering two little girls. Like I'd done with either Amanda or
Melissa in such a condition, I began brushing at the very bottom of the
strands, remembering to take my time not to pull. A miraculous thing
happened to me as I started brushing that old man's hair. Everybody
else in the room disappeared. There was no one alive for those moments
except that old man and me. I brushed and I brushed and I brushed until
every tangle was out of that hair. I know this sounds so strange, but
I've never felt that kind of love for another soul in my entire life. I
believe with all my heart, I - for that few minutes - felt a portion of
the very love of God. That He had overtaken my heart
for a little while
like someone renting a room and making Himself at home for a short
while.
The emotions were so strong and so pure that I knew they had to be
God's. His hair was finally as soft and smooth as an infant's.
I slipped the brush back in the bag and went around the chair to face
him. I got back down on my knees, put my hands on his knee and said,
'Sir, do you know my Jesus?'
He said, 'Yes, I do'
Well, that figures, I thought.
He explained, 'I've known Him since I married my bride. She wouldn't
marry me until I got to know the Savior.' He said, 'You see, the
problem is, I haven't seen my bride in months. I've had open-heart
surgery, and she's been too ill to come see me. I was sitting here
thinking to myself, what a mess I must be for my bride.'
Only God knows how often He allows us to be part of a divine moment
when we're completely unaware of the significance. This, on the other
hand, was one of those rare encounters when I knew God had intervened
in details only He could have known. It was a God moment, and I'll
never forget it.
Our time came to board, and we were not on the same plane. I was deeply
ashamed of how I'd acted earlier and would have been so proud to have
accompanied him on that aircraft.
I still had a few minutes, and as I gathered my things to board, the
airline hostess ret
urned from the corridor, tears streaming down her
cheeks. She said, 'That old man's sitting on the plane, sobbing. Why
did you do that? What made you do that?'
I said, 'Do you know Jesus? He can be the bossiest thing!'
And we got to share.
I learned something about God that day. He knows if you're exhausted,
you're hungry, you're serving in the wrong place or it is time to move
on but you feel too responsible to budge. He knows if you're hurting or
feeling rejected. He knows if you're sick or drowning under a wave of
temptation. Or He knows if you just need your hair brushed. He sees you
as an individual. Tell Him your need!
I got on my own flight, sobs choking my throat, wondering how many
opportunities just like that one had I missed along the way... all
because I didn't want people to think I was strange.
God didn't send me to that old man. He sent that old man to me.
Please share this wonderful story.
'Life isn't about how to survive the storm, but how to dance in the
rain!
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