The Master Carpenter and His Tools

Ecclesiastes 3:14
I know that everything God does will endure forever; nothing can be added to it and nothing taken from it. God does it so that men will revere him.

I find great comfort in knowing that God is in control, and great excitement when He lets me be a part of what He is doing. I often marvel at what He is doing in me and through me, wondering at how He could trust me when He knows me so well - faults and all. I’m sure He gets very tired of my asking Him "What if I mess up?" It probably comes up in conversation at least once a day. Then He reminds me - it has nothing to do with me . . . "Oh yeah!" You’d think I’d get it by now.

I am memorizing this verse as a way to remember that I am not the one making things happen - that is God’s job. I am just the tool. Just like a hammer is absolutely, completely useless without the carpenter, so I am absolutely, completely useless with my Carpenter. The nail that is driven in by the hammer knows only the hammer, as the hammer is the tool the carpenter is using to do the job. Yet, the carpenter is the one in complete control - deciding where to put the nail, how deep to drive it, and so forth. And when the masterpiece is complete, the carpenter is the one who gets all the credit, not the tools.

As the tools of the Master Carpenter, we can do only what He would have us do, and it is so good to remember that we can’t mess it up when we’re in His hands. Those around us may see only our work - that which we say, and do, but when all is said and done, there will be no doubt in anyone’s mind Who gets the credit. Praise His mighty name!
"Why?" we may ask. "Why does He bother using us? Why does He bother at all?" "...so that men will revere Him." He simply wants to be known. He wants His "tools" to love Him, just as He loves them (ask any man, and he’ll tell you that his tools are very precious to him!). And He wants the "nails" to stop, look around them, see the finished product and look up in awe and wonder, thanking Him that they were able to be a part of such a miraculous and beautiful thing.

I believe God would ask us today, "What will you do?" Will we resist the callous hands of this rough Man, insisting that we should be a power drill, when we have been designed to drive in nails? Or will we be the hammer, yielding ourselves to the Master Carpenter’s strong, capable hands? Will we let Him use us in whatever way He needs to? We are the only "tool" of our kind - unique, and beautiful! And when He is through, we will be able to look at the work completed and know that we were a part of it - eternal, beautiful, infallible. A masterpiece, done so that we might look to the One who made it, and know Him, love Him, and see His great beauty.