God's Workbench

God's Workbench

When I was a kid, my dad had a huge workbench in the garage. It was black with use, but orderly with a light oily smell. He had a corkboard above with hooks suspending endless tools; clean and well worn. I remember a fine-toothed saw and another with jagged crocodile teeth. On the desktop lay more tools; an adjustable wrench, pliers, a notched-handled screwdriver, and a set of silver wrenches that gleamed like jewelry.

Above the bench was a piece of plywood between rafters that held a pile of lumber just waiting for an imagination to lift some down for a go-cart or lean-to. With that bench, a big yard and an engaged imagination, there were endless possibilities. Standing behind those tools, there was a sense of excitement and power.

We are all tools on God’s workbench. Hopefully we are willing tools in the hand of the Creator, who uses each of us to accomplish the projects He is working on in building His kingdom. Some of us are used on many projects; others are committed to one project for a lifetime.

Sometimes we kids would swipe a tool from Dad to build a fort or fix a toy, and leave it in the yard to get wet and rusty. Sometimes I feel like that when I leave the workbench of God to work on my own projects. I may accomplish something, but outside the safety of the bench, I am left uncared for. And then the wonderful day when I am found again, dried off and set again on the honorable workbench until he has a job for me.

There have been other times in my life when I have felt like the obscure tool in the drawer, forgotten and unused—my strange shape making people wonder what I could possibly be used for. And then a snag comes up in a project and I am the perfect solution to get to the next step.

My dad always said, “Use the right tool for the right job.” But sometimes when you can’t find the right tool, you have to make due. There are times when I felt like a hammer pounding in a screw…or better yet, the screw getting pounded by a hammer, because there was not the appropriate tool willing for the job. I wonder if our lives would become a little easier if all God’s tools were willing to do the jobs He intended for us.

Not too long ago, God had us working on something, and then switched us to another project in the middle of the job. My initial response was frustration and resistance. How could God stop work on MY project? And then I realized; it was never ours to begin with…and who is to say that work has stopped just because we’ve been moved to another kingdom project? He is the Creator. In that realization, I have much peace. Now He has us settled again in another project. We feel fulfilled, using our skills to complete kingdom tasks. We can see results and that is a tremendous blessing.

Since we’ve been married, we’ve been trying to follow God’s leading, step by step, working on the projects He lays out for us, and sometimes switching projects when He needs us somewhere else. Without that understanding, our decisions may look erratic and confusing; changing projects every few years and having a baby in each state we have lived in! But from the Creator’s perspective, our life is secure and stable as a part of His toolset. It gives us joy to know that we fit perfectly within his plan no matter where it takes us.

Jon and Mindy Hirst