We are in our faith series, friends, and
as we study the life of faith, our
main objective is to affect change in someone's
life.
My objective isn't to fill your head with
teaching and leave your heart untouched.
My prayer is that God will take some
of these truths we are discussing and take
out his divine surgeon's scalpel and cut on
you a new attitude and outlook, wake you
up and clean you up so you can
be a clean and empty channel for God
to flow through in power and transformation.
I remember a story my homiletical mentor, Dr.
Stephen F.
Oldford shared with me, and I'll never forget
it.
A pastor friend of his invited Dr. Oldford
to go hear a young preacher who was
making some noise among Southern Baptists.
Well, Dr. Oldford traveled with this pastor friend
to go hear this young man preach in
a nearby town.
On the drive back, the pastor asked Stephen
Oldford what he thought of the young preacher.
Dr. Oldford replied, oh, fine, very promising.
But then he added, but he hasn't suffered
enough yet.
Stephen Oldford knew what he was talking about
because he understood the connection between usefulness and
brokenness.
Listen, friends, God's eyes are continually searching the
earth for those rare individuals whose lives of
brokenness was directly connected to their usefulness.
Men like Moses and John the Baptist, Whitefield
and Wesley, Finney and Moody, men who live
in a different atmosphere than other mortals, men
who have annihilated self with the cross and
whose lives are broken, alabaster boxes from which
fragrances arise to the heavens from the broken
pieces of surrender and sacrifice.
God uses broken vessels to bring him glory
and to demonstrate he alone is a sovereign
ruler of all mankind.
I wanna share a story with you, friends,
that clearly illustrates the relationship between brokenness and
usefulness in a life of faith.
If you'll bear with me, I'll give you
that story now.
This is a story about the evangelist Sam
Jones, whose mighty preaching turned the city of
Nashville, Tennessee upside down in the year 1885
and saw revival and made Sam Jones a
household word throughout America.
Well, one day, Sam Jones was at home
in Cordersville, Georgia when he received a telegram
from Texas inviting him to go preach to
the cowboys of Southwest Texas.
Well, he prayed about it and he got
on a train and went to Texas.
And for two weeks, he preached the gospel
of Jesus Christ to the cowboys of Texas.
When it was over, as they came to
the end of the campaign, the cowboys wanted
to give Sam Jones a love offering.
They felt the laborer was worthy of his
hire and they had received wonderful blessings from
his time among them.
But there was a problem.
They had no money, not a single dollar
in any of their pockets, and they didn't
know what to do.
And they allowed Sam Jones to go back
to Cordersville, Georgia with no compensation or love
offering of any kind, whatever.
Well, Sam Jones went back and a number
of weeks passed.
Then suddenly, one day, he received a telegram.
It was from the cowboys of Texas.
It read like this.
We are sending and we are shipping you
a carload of Broncos.
And Sam Jones scratched his head as he
looked in amazement at that telegram.
What am I gonna do, he said, with
a carload of wild horses in the small
town of Cordersville?
Well, his friend was standing beside him and
he said, why, it's easy.
Hold an auction sale, sell the Broncos, and
you'll get your money.
You can get your love offering then and
put it in your pocket.
Sam Jones thought it was a good suggestion,
so he held an auction sale.
He sold the Broncos, all except one.
He kept the finest-looking Bronco for his
son.
He wanted to give that Bronco to his
son as a gift, and that's what he
did.
But the son had never in his life
been on the back of an unbroken Bronco,
and Sam Jones wondered what he could do.
He called the cowboy to him who had
brought the carload of Broncos to Cordersville and
said, will you take this Bronco?
Will you break him so that my son
can ride him?
Yes, sir, said the cowboy.
I'd be glad to.
How much will you charge?
$15, said the cowboy.
All right, said Sam.
Take him away.
The cowboy disappeared with the Bronco.
Two weeks later, he came back.
Is he broken?
Said Sam.
Yes, sir, he's broken.
Can my son ride him in perfect safety?
Yes, sir, your son can ride him in
perfect safety.
All right then, here's your $15.
The father thought that before allowing his son
to ride the Bronco, he'd better mount himself
and make sure that the cowboy had broken
the Bronco.
He started toward the Bronco.
The cowboy came running up, waving his hands
in alarm.
Why, said Sam.
What's the matter?
What's gone wrong?
Oh, said the cowboy.
He's only been broken on one side and
you're mounting from the wrong side.
Oh, said Sam, that will never do.
My son might make a mistake.
He might mount from the wrong side.
How much will you charge me to break
him on the other side?
$15, said the cowboy.
All right, said Sam.
Take him away and break him on the
other side.
Well, another two weeks passed by him.
Again, the cowboy returned, leading the Bronco.
Is he broken?
Said Sam.
Yes, sir, he's broken.
Both sides?
Yes, sir, both sides.
Your son can ride him in perfect safety
from either side.
All right, here's your $15.
Well, I like that story, friend, because it's
so true.
You know, the average Christian is only broken
on one side.
He'll do this, but he won't do that.
He'll go here, but he won't go there.
He'll give God just so much of himself,
but still hold something back.
He's like the Bronco.
He's only broken on one side.
And then he wonders why God doesn't use
him more.
He doesn't realize he's only been broken on
one side.
And God cannot rely upon him.
God cannot trust him.
The man God uses is the man who's
been broken on both sides.
But some Broncos don't break so easily.
They're more stubborn, more hard-headed, more self
-willed.
People are like that.
At times, God has to use more drastic
measures with us to get us to comply
with him.
Listen to me, friend, and get the wax
out of your ears so you can hear
me.
God wants to increase your faith so you
can be more useful to him.
But faith and brokenness go hand in hand
like mashed potatoes and gravy.
The men of faith I've known in my
life who had power with God were broken
men.
Alan Redpath used to say before God can
use a man, he must crush him.
We get a sense of this brokenness from
Psalm 51.
King David fell into moral failure with Bathsheba.
But after that incident, he was broken over
his sin and broken off from his sin.
He never sinned like that again.
And Psalm 51, we see the vivid picture
of a man completely broken before God.
Psalm 51, 17 reads, the sacrifices of God
are a broken spirit, a broken and contrite
heart, O God, thou will not despise.
Notice, friends, the word broken is twice mentioned,
for David is broken on both sides.
And that word contrite speaks of something that's
been ground to powder.
David's sin of adultery, murder drives him to
repentance to be completely broken on both sides,
a broken spirit and a broken and contrite
heart.
I believe God uses broken things.
Our faith must be developed through a time
of brokenness in our life where all we
can do is abandon ourself to God and
believe him to be who he says he
is so he can affect change in us.
If you've been stuck, friend, in a place
where you're wondering why God doesn't use you
more, perhaps the reason is you were only
broken on one side.
God cannot rely upon you.
If you're brutally honest with yourself, you may
know that deep down, you may be a
little hard-headed, a little too stubborn for
your own good.
And your only hope of going deeper with
God is to give in to him, to
yield it all to him, to where God
can bring you, to that place where he
wants to bring you.
So when people look at you, all they
see is the power and glory of God
pressing through a broken, yielded vessel.
When you get there, friend, you will experience
enough of the reality of God to live
on for the rest of your life.
I think I see this clearly when I
read Philippians 3.10, for in there is
a striking life principle which always leaps out
at me.
The word of God declares there that I
may know him and the power of his
resurrection and the fellowship of his sufferings being
made conformable onto his death.
You see, friends, if you want the power
of his resurrection in your life, then you
must be deeply familiar with the fellowship of
his sufferings.
The power comes into a life that is
broken on both sides.