I don’t like to be presumed “dumb” – even if I am blonde!  I know I don’t have the highest IQ in the world but I’m not dumb (unless it concerns math!)  And no one that I know wants to be made the fool.  None of us want to appear lacking!

There are some things in the Bible that if I had been asked to do them . . . I don’t know that I would have had the nerve.  Why?  Because they are a little bit “out there” – crazy things or things I would say might sound dumb!

Take for instance when Elisha sent word to Naaman to dip seven times in the Jordan and he would be cleansed of his leprosy (II Kings 5.)  Naaman at first reacted just as I would have.  What?  That’s crazy! Of all the nerve!  When you read the story and find out his servants encouraged him to do just that – he did – and was cleansed!  WOW!

What about the widowed mother who was desperate to save her sons from being sold and Elisha told her to gather all the empty jars she could beg or borrow (and no, not steal!) and from her meager supply of oil begin to pour out of her limited resource into all the borrowed pots.  No wonder Elisha told her to shut the door!  The neighbors would have thought she was crazy for sure!  (II Kings  4.)  She obeyed and the oil kept coming until she had no more pots to fill!  WOW!  She sold the oil and had the money to pay off the debts and keep her sons (hope she paid the people for the borrowed pots!).

Another “widow” story … I Kings 17 tells about Elijah approaching a  widow who lived in the town of Zarephath.  There was a terrible famine and she was at the end of her pantry food stuffs.  Elijah comes along and asks for some bread.  She answers that she only has enough to make a small meal for her son and herself then they will lay down and die.  But the audacity of the preacher asks her to make his first then to make another for her son and herself “for thus says the Lord God of Israel: ‘the bin of flour shall not be used up, nor shall the jar of oil run dry, until the day the Lord sends rain on the earth.’” WOW … can you imagine?  She did and so did the bin and jar!  What confidence she must have had!

OK – walking around Jericho once each day for six days and then seven times on the seventh day!  Don’t you think maybe they felt a little silly?  And to do it without talking – now that was a miracle! ☺  (Joshua 6.).  But they did it and the walls fell enabling them to take the city.

Here are a few from the New Testament:  It’s a wedding and they run out of wine.  Jesus tells them to fill the pots with water and then pour some out and serve it to the master of the feast.  Come on!  Give me a break!  Serve the water to the master and try to make him think its wine?  But they do and it IS wine! (John 2.)

The disciple needs money to pay his taxes and he has none.  Jesus tells him to go fishing! Yeah!  A day off … but he still needs to pay his taxes!  But Jesus doesn’t just tell him to go fishing … He tells him that the money he needs will be in the mouth of the fish! Huh? (Matthew 17:27) … and it was!

Jesus spitting and putting mud on the eyes of the blind man and then telling him to go wash it off and his eyes would be open?  Try that today and you’d be slapped with a lawsuit! (John 9.)

I think one of my favorites is the feeding of the 5,000 men – don’t you know that had to include many more woman and children to boot!  So to be conservative let’s say 20,000 might have been there.  Now the people are hungry.  The disciples could find only 5 loaves of bread and 2 fish to serve the huge crowd.  Then Jesus told the disciples to have the people gather in groups of 50 and 100 (sure hope my group disappears!).  Jesus took the bread and fish gave thanks for it, blessed it, broke it and then gave it to the disciples to give to the multitude.  Can you picture these big guys thinking, “WHAT! Now wait a minute!  All I have is a few crumbs of bread and even less a sliver of fish and I’m to go out there and feed my section of 2,000 people!! I’ll be the laughing stock of all time around here.  No way am I going to do something so dumb and so embarrassing! No way am I going to do that!” (Only miracle found in all four gospels…starts in Matthew 14).

But they DO it!  And as they DO it – the miracle happens.  The loaves and fish MULTIPLY to feed ALL (with 12 basketfulls left over!  I’ve always wondered if each disciple took a basketfull home?!)

My point – sometimes (I might add … many times!)  we may feel that Father is asking us to do something that doesn’t make sense.  Something that may sound really crazy, or even dumb.  We are terrified to obey.  But who are we to question God?  His ways and thoughts are higher than ours and certainly more creative.

How does it work that “… believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, thou shalt be saved”?  But it does. (Acts 16:31.)

How does tithing work?  You work so hard for your wages and then God says, “give me a tenth and I’ll make the rest multiply”?  But it works!  “Lay hands on the sick and they shall recover.” Mark 16:18. “Give and it shall be given unto you …” Luke 6:38. “Be ye holy for I amholy.” I Peter 1:16.

Over and over in the Bible we see things that in the natural don’t make a lot of sense but if we can get over our preconceived ideas of what God is like and how He works, or we think “how” He should work, and trust Him when He tells us to do something, we might see a lot more done in His name.