Sidewalk Counseling Handbook "PART 3"

August 01, 2004

10. WE'RE NOT CALLED TO BE SUCCESSFUL -- WE'RE CALLED TO BE OBEDIENT

But, remember, male or female, young or old, we can't save every baby. We can't spare every mom, as much as we want to. I had to let that burden go, and I realized I can't save the world, I'm just one woman. And you can't save the world. You can only do the very best that you can with what the Lord has given you.

And as I said before, if the Holy Spirit of God can't sway everyone else, how can you and I do that? But the Lord will use us. And I know that things are rough, and the world is in disarray, but we need to look and realize that, praise God! Our God is still in control. He is a mighty, awesome God, and nothing happens except that it passes through His hand and His approval. Nothing takes Him by surprise, and it shouldn't take us by surprise, either. Let's not be in awe of our circumstances and our new rules and our new regulations and our injunctions or what-have-you. Let us be in awe of our incredible, awesome God.

Don't sing "Our God Is An Awesome God" if you don't believe it. Don't sing it. It's hypocrisy, unless we really believe with all our hearts that He is an awesome, powerful God. He's still the God that parted the Red Sea. He has not lost one iota of His power and His strength. Let's not shrink God into our little molds of what we think He can and cannot do.

And don't give up, don't give up, don't give up. When the battle rages, and the enemy comes in like a flood, praise God! You raise the banner higher, and you remember who we are in Christ Jesus.

And, another thing. If you get an injunction put on you or a bubble zone or F.A.C.E., or whatever, let's not just always assume that it's because the Enemy is in control. God may just be setting up an opportunity for you to prove Him. He wants to do that. He says, "Prove me. Prove me and know that I am mighty. Prove me and know that I am God."

You don't need God as much sitting behind a computer as you do out in that street. You're going to learn to need God in a way that you never did before. And the more that the Enemy sets in the way to trample us, the more we can lean unto Him.

And when they put the injunction on us there in Atlanta, they said we couldn't be within fifty feet of the property line. That put us on the other side of the wall. You can't sidewalk counsel from over there. And we couldn't hand out literature or speak to the girls or anything within fifty feet of the property line. But God told me, "You just obey Me, and the enemy will not triumph over you."

We ignored it. Joanna ignored it. The other counselors ignored it, and we continued day after day after day. The penalty for violating the injunction, when the judge decides to bring you in, is twenty days in jail and a $500 fine, multiplied by how many times you have been written up. One of my counselors, Sue, was brought in and found guilty of violating the injunction and sentenced to five and a half months in jail. She'd been written up seven times. I had been written up sixty-three. That's four and a half years in jail and a $32,000 fine. God said, "You just obey Me, and the enemy will not triumph over you."

This went on for twelve months. I knew what was going on. After a while, God prevailed, and God did miracle after miracle after miracle.

At first, there would be six or seven squad cars out there. And finally they figured out they didn't need all those squad cars for little old me or for Anne or Sue and me. So they just had one squad car, they parked across the street, and they backed in so they could watch. What they started to see was women coming, parking their cars, getting helped. We weren't harassing them. We weren't yelling at them. We weren't running after them. They were voluntarily stopping and talking to us. The officers were close enough to see their facial expressions, see the tears start, put their arms around us, and walk away and never go in. And the police went "WHOOP WHOOP" on their sirens, they started going "thump! thump!" out of both windows, because God was breaking the hearts of the police officers.

They started taking us to lunch and bringing us hot tea when it's cold and iced tea when it's hot, bringing warm clothing.

God can do it. God can sway the hearts of the enemy. And He says He needs to but look upon the enemy, blow on them, and they'll be no more. That's the God that stands behind us and what we do.

So let's just be continuing in what we know is the right thing to do. I have these tea bags, these herb teas, and they have these little sayings on them, and my tea bag the other morning was a quote from Abraham Lincoln, and it says, "Let us have faith that right means might." That God is on our side. That is where the power and the glory will come from. The Lord will send you encouragement.

I was standing out there one day, and I use this because I draw on it many many times. The Lord just sends incredible people my way for encouragement. But one day I was at Mid-Town, and I had not been home for a year, and I missed my family and my children so much, I was broken hearted. And I was going home for the first time. And when it rains in Atlanta, it really rains, and I was drenched. I was always drenched. The wind blows, and my umbrellas are always blowing inside out -- I have skeletons of umbrellas all over the city of Atlanta. And this one morning, my umbrella was already gone, and I was standing there, and my collar was full of rain, my pockets were full of rain, I was drenched to the bone, and Michael, one of the Satan worshippers came by, and he was taunting me and telling me, "You're not going to win this battle, Black." And he took all of his Satanic jewelry and stuck it in my face and said, "He's got BIG plans for you."

And the Lord reminded me of that verse that says, "I know the plans that I have for you, declares the Lord, not plans for evil, but plans for hope and a future." God has His plans for each one of us.

That particular day, there was a woman, and I perceived that she was afraid of childbirth, and I didn't think she would listen to me at all, but as she started to drive in with her car, I said, "Honey, you need to run away from here," but she went in anyway. About thirty minutes later, I was standing out there, and I was saying, "Lord, I'm going home tomorrow, for the first time. I don't want to come back here. Nobody likes me. Nobody cares that I'm out here. It's raining all the time. I'm freezing to death half the time. The rescuers are all in jail. I'm out here by myself. Nobody cares." I was having a major pity party. And I said, "Lord, I need actual, verbal encouragement, or I'm afraid I won't come back."

That woman came running up the sidewalk, and she was dragging her purse. She came running up, and she said, "I'm doing what you said, I'm going to run away from here! I was going to get in my car and go out the back driveway, but God told me to come up here and tell you your labors are not in vain." I talked to her; she didn't know the Lord. He caused her to quote scripture to me. She took me by my shoulders and she shook me and she said, "Do you hear me? Do you hear me? Don't you ever stop doing what you're doing! If you weren't here today, my child would be dead. You don't stop." Her name was April.

God will send encouragement your way.

You expect discouragement. It's not a fun place to be. Satan hates you with every fiber of his evil being. And he isn't going to let you just go out there and let it happen. No way. He's going to be there and fight you every inch of the way. Just stand up, with God's armor, and you face the Enemy.

David went after Goliath. He ran after Goliath! He hit him in the head with the power of God, and he chopped off his head and put it on a stick! We need to run into the Enemy's face with the righteousness and the power of God and not look back. And expect to be discouraged and expect our God to encourage us.

It's not fun to be out there. Your feet hurt and your back hurts. You get your feelings hurt, and people are nasty to you. So what!

No matter what happens to us, it cannot compare with what happens to the women and the children. And we need to get some spiritual sand in our pants. We really do. We're a bunch of little marshmallows, and I may not be speaking to everyone reading this. I know many are not. There are many incredible, godly men and women, and I'm proud to be a part of the body of Christ with such saints, but, nevertheless, each one of us have areas in which we can give more fully to the Lord, more completely, and be more and more of Him and not of ourselves.

Most of all, don't be overwhelmed. As Joanna said, you're there for the woman that wants the help -- you just don't know who she is. You have to approach each woman like that. If she doesn't receive you, let it go. Don't take it home with you. Don't bear that burden. Otherwise, it will render you helpless and unable to continue.

First Corinthians 4:12 says you are only required to be found faithful. Remember that the battle is the Lord's and that we are just to be human instruments in His hand.

I went to a yard sale in Atlanta a long time ago. I saw this man sitting in a chair, hardly able to stand because he was so crippled from arthritis, and his fingers were all gnarled up. He had a photo album there. He was a carpenter. And he showed all of his wonderful "creations," he called them. He had created, over the years, these beautiful pieces of furniture. And I looked at them, and I thought about the photo album I have at home. You also may have a photo album of the babies God has saved through you. God's creations, beautiful little faces. And he was selling his tools. He called them his "faithful tools," and I thought, "What else can they be? They're just tools. They just lay there." And I looked down at them, and one of the tools caught my eye in particular. It was a hammer. It had an old-fashioned wooden handle. It had been used by this creative, gifted carpenter for so many years that the handle was shiny and smooth. And I looked at that, and I looked at him. And I thought, this carpenter, he's standing there with gnarled-up hands and limited power and limited ability. I looked at the hammer. And I thought, I want to be that hammer, I want to be that yielded instrument in the hands of the Carpenter of all carpenters. I want to rest in His hand, and I want to be His power. He creates things that mortal man can never do, and our God's hands aren't gnarled up, and there's no limit to Him.

Let me encourage you to allow yourself to rest in the hand of Almighty God, the Carpenter of carpenters. And, perhaps in time, you and I will shine like that hammer, that instrument. We will shine forth to a lost and dying world.

Adapted from a seminar given May 7, 1994 by Karen Black

Karen Black can be reached at:
WOMEN 4 WOMEN
P. O. Box 1971
Duluth, Georgia 30136
(770) 232-1991