Truth is stranger than fiction they say. They also say that a stranger is somebody you do not know personally. That is two meanings for the same word – no wonder foreigners areperpetually baffled by the English language.
Truth has only one meaning – something either is or is not true. I count it a privilege to be able to tell my true story which has a total stranger in it.
I felt as if I was in a tunnel, dark and musty, afraid to move. If I took even one step I might find my foot in water, mud or worse. Better to stay where I was safe even though it was dark. But I was not happy there – I had to do something – now maybe. I would go church on Sunday and an answer to my agonizing queries would come – I hoped so. In way, I had to leave the safety of the harbour and venture into the unknown that I instinctively knew I should get to.
Timeously, there was a visiting minister from another friendlysuburban church – a stranger in our midst. He humbly entered the pulpit and announced his text which was the first line of Psalms 23. “The Lord is my Shepherd”. He said he was going to analyse the words in this line. “The Lord” he eloquentlysaid, “not a Lord – there are plenty of them in the British Peerage, but The Lord, and there is only one”. He was innocently charismatic, gracefully engaging the congregants in a manner evident of genuine love – he was born to be an authentic minister.
“Is”, he went on, “Not was or will be if I am good but now- this very minute and second.” He paused for an amplemoment as if to let it sink and carried on, “My Shepherd – a shepherd does not have only one sheep, he has a flock but I am definitely one of them.” There was another natural pause, then he unequivocally declared to the congregation, “So are you’’. But he did not emphasise what we should do to beworthy of that flock. I had grown tired of over the years of all the things I should do anyway. It also made me feel like I was in a tunnel with light at the end – an oncoming train.
When I got home I sent a letter to that minister, telling him how much I had thoroughly enjoyed his sermon and asking if I could possibly visit him. To my delight he said, “Yes”. So I went. Then followed nearly a year of counselling on his part andkeen listening on mine. It was extraordinarily amazing to me how simple he made it all sound; not full of admonitions and prohibitions that I had been used to hearing. It was wonderfully odd.
Then, one unforgettable glorious day, I resolutely took the step – no water, no mud, no ordure; only light and I could say, “I will dwell in His Home forever.” And do you know, that stranger never once told me what I should do, but suggested that with God’s help I do whatever I could do to make the world a better place.
I am relentlessly working on it – I can purposefully see where I am going with unsurpassed clarity– in the paths of righteousness, beside the still waters for His name’s sake.
So Psalms 23 will be my guide from now on and I will always be grateful to the stranger who showed me the path and the light. I know you too might have benefited from this stranger you just encountered in my story – thanks to the gift of being able to marry pen with paper.