Every Person Has An Impact

He was driving to his barber shop when he saw me bless him and as he passed he muttered, "What, in God's name was that?"

That's when the Holy Spirit stepped in and nudged him a bit. "Why don't you go see? Maybe he needs help." Kenneth's car slowed as he wrestled with the idea a bit. "I need to get to work. Maybe he's some kind of weirdo." he thought. "Go and see" came the whisper and so he reluctantly turned around.

As we talked a bit, he told me a story about a woman who showed up at his church one day. She came in an old beat up van and carried a keyboard. She "looked Pentecostal," he said which I took to mean she had long hair fashioned in a bun of sorts and wore a dress rather than slacks. Kenneth goes to a small country church and he said the lady went up and asked the pastor if she might play a song sometime during worship. The pastor replied, "Of course" and after announcements the pastor introduced the "special music" for the morning.

Well, the lady didn't didn't go up to the platform and face the congregation. Instead she sat in the front row with her keyboard in her lap and faced the altar. Seems like she decided to sing to God instead of entertaining the people. She then began to play and sing that great America standard Amazing Grace. "It was beautiful, Kenneth said, "better than anything we expected from an old grandma dressed in a flowered dress."

After she finished she took her keyboard and sat in the back of the church. The pastor went on to preach and then closed his service by asking everyone to bow their heads, close their eyes and pray. He never asked for a love offering for the lady. Kenneth, who was sitting in the back of the church opposite the woman, decided that when the preacher was finished he was going to go and give the woman whatever he had in his pocket. He said the van needed some attending to. Come to find out later that several of the other men had the same thought and had already taken money out of their pocket in anticipation of blessing the woman.

When the minister said "Amen" many people turned to see the woman but she was gone! No one had seen her leave or heard her van start up. No one else in town had seen her nor did she ever return. No one knows who she was or where she is today but one thing they do know is that she was a blessing.

You may not have made as a mysterious entrance or exit into someone's life....or perhaps you have and don't know it!....but one thing is for sure...your life has an impact on others! You matter!

As Kenneth was leaving, he mentioned to me that he has several crosses in his barber shop. I wondered how many people have been influenced, blessed or persuaded by just seeing those crosses and the public acknowledgment of God in his business. Often Kenneth, you and I have no idea of how God uses us every day.

EVERY person has an impact for God and that EVERY includes you and I.