Drunk Magicians

       I spent this past weekend in Lexington, KY at the National Missionary Convention. Like I expected I went to great classes, saw many friends, heard great preaching, and staid in a nice hotel among thousands of Christians. Yet, the thing that stood out to me most was something I was not expecting.

       I was about to go on a walk down town with three of our high school kids when we were stopped out of Starbucks. A middle aged man gently grabbed my hand and stood to talk to us. He leaned in to our faces allowing our eyes to take in the lines a hard life had drawn upon his face, and for our nostrils to sting with the stench of alcohol pouring from his mouth. He introduced himself as Floyd and raised his shirt to show the leftovers from many surgeries and pointed to his wife who just had a hip replacement. He said that he wasn't asking for money, but that if his magic tricks impressed us he wouldn't turn down a dollar or two. I turned to the three kids and their faces were glued to me, looking for the cue to excuse ourselves and bolt. While this didn't surprise me, it made me stay. We watched his magic tricks figuring a few of them out. The kids started to look for any cash that might have but I knew more was supposed to happen. I told Floyd that I had cash but that I wanted to pray with him before I handed it over. He and Caroline were more than eager for this. I wrapped my arm around Caroline and our prayer circle formed. Nothing special happened during that prayer, It was merely two drunks, a college student, and three high school students praying what we have all prayed before. 

       It was after we walked away that I truly saw the affects this prayer had. We rejoined our group and they talked about how that could have been a scam and their heartfelt prayer might have been a practiced line. All I and the kids could answer was "maybe".  It really bothered me the rest of the night how our group made up of ministers and ministry students only saw the scam in Floyd and Caroline. They might have been a scam but I know that God used that encounter. Floyd and Caroline might have blown the money on booze, they might be amused by our prayers but someone was changed. I and these high school kids did what we were supposed to do and gained so much from it. We allowed God to use a possible scam as training for our futures.

          While I care about Floyd and Caroline I don't care about how they used the money, for I gained so much from giving to them. We need to start putting aside our doubt and be open to sharing the love of Christ. We need to be willing to under go a scam in order to give physically and spiritually to those who are in need. We need to be willing to pray with a drunk magician so that he might truly pray to God.