Scattered, Gathered, Delivered

During a recent prayer time a picture of an old childhood travel game came to my mind. Wooly Willy. It was a piece of cardboard with a man’s face on it, totally hairless, covered by plastic with small shavings of metal pooled at the bottom. It came with a magnetic pen that you used to pick up clumps of the metal shavings and move them around Willy’s face, giving him hair, a beard, a mustache, eye brows, nose hair, etc… It was minutes of entertainment on long road trips.

I can’t remember the last time I’ve thought about that game, so it caught my attention. I recall it being too frustrating for me to build hair for Willy. I could never get it to look as neat as the picture examples to the side of his face. (Let’s blame that on the bumpy car ride instead of my eye-hand coordination, okay? ) So I created a different challenge. I liked to see how much of the metal shavings I could collect and move at once—hoping to get all of them, but satisfied with big patches. The slower you moved the pen over the shavings the more you could pick up at one time. That’s the picture I saw during prayer—the gathering of small pieces into one mass.

So, here’s the deal. If you are feeling scattered, broken into pieces, or shaved so thin you’re barely there, this is for you. Or, maybe you are feeling naked and exposed, like Willy’s face, this if for you too.

We are scattered.
He gathers.
He holds.
He delivers.

We have a promise in scripture that the Lord delivers us. He is the deliverer. Deliverance is more than just being rescued. When God delivers us, he pick us up from one place and sets us in a different place. King David puts it like this, [the Lord] drew me up from the pit of destruction, out of the miry bog, and set my feet upon a rock, making my steps secure (Psalm 40:2). Although we may be suspended for a moment in the process, we are being held in the capable and sure hands of God. A very good place to be in the meanwhile. Isaiah says it like this, [the Lord God] will gather the lambs in his arms; he will carry them in his bosom (Isaiah 40:11).

The only thing we have to do in the delivery process is surrender. That’s easier said than done, at least in my experience. Fear screams at the unknowns in the rescue. Control kicks and bucks the rescue process. Pride will sass back with our own strength and ability. But when we surrender to the Deliverer, like the metal shavings to the magnetic pen in Wooly Willy, God does the picking up and moving.

We are scattered — broken and shaved thin
He gathers —rescues us from the places we are stuck
He holds — carries us for as long as necessary
He delivers — sets our feet in new, secure places

Don’t let fear, control, and pride keep you in or send you back to the same old pit. A very important key to Wooly Willy is laying the board down flat. If you keep the board upright, the metal shavings will fall back to the bottom every time. Surrender is as simple as asking, as admitting our need. Surrender is laying down our control. David confessed to the Lord, As for me, I am poor and needy, but the Lord takes thought for me. You are my help and my deliverer; do not delay, O my God! (Psalm 40:17).

Lastly, if you are feeling naked and exposed, like Willy’s bare face, there is also a receiving end to his deliverance. We are rescued from death into life. He gathers and carries his life to you, and places good things on you and in you. Unlike me, God has great eye-hand coordination! He is the master of making things new. He is ordering your steps and planting you in his courts where you are guaranteed to flourish (Psalm 92).