Opportunities in Unexpected Places

God has a way of opening opportunities in unexpected places.

            This week, Perham Focus ran a lead story with the headline “Perham kicks off 150 years with never-before-seen activities: Tarot readings and more”  The article talked about a local resident who references his tarot reading by saying “I feel it’s a gift and a calling…I really believe it’s a natural gift God created, and it’s my purpose.” When I first heard about it, many questions went through my mind.  How can someone identify a practice of the occult as being a gift from God?  What more, why is it being celebrated in our local paper?  A gut reaction was to think that we need to do a better job at teaching why these things are wrong.  We should be opposing these things.  But then, God gave me another thought.  What if this is a redemptive opportunity that we can use to share the Jesus? 

            Our mission at Crosspoint is to point people of all backgrounds toward a relationship with Jesus Christ.  God has placed every one of us in a setting with non-believers, whether that is family, neighbors, or co-workers.  We can’t make anyone follow Christ, but we can plant seeds in their life through spiritual conversations.  It can be difficult to find ways to do this.  Starting conversations about Jesus can often feel awkward and scary.  However, a news story like this provides a natural opportunity to start a conversation about spiritual things.  In this instance, when we are talking about tarot reading, we can talk about demonic activity or about why Christians trust God with our future.      

            There is a lot of junk in our culture and I don’t see it getting any better.  There are many things happening in our culture that Christians should be opposing, such as abortion or racism.  But we should also be looking for opportunities that the culture gives us to talk about our faith.  They happen quite often, but we tend to either not notice them or just let them pass by.  My prayer is that God would open our eyes to see those opportunities and have the wisdom on how to use them for his glory.