The Man (or Woman) God Uses

Most of us have heard powerful messages about the kind of person God uses. We are told it is the one who rises early to pray, the one who is moral and blameless, the one who pays the price in the secret place, the man or woman of great faith and great passion. And much of that may be true. But somewhere along the way the message gets turned around, until we believe God uses people because they became so dedicated, so disciplined, so pure. As if the anointing were a reward for finally getting our lives in order.

That single misunderstanding may be the biggest reason we do not see more of God's power in our midst. Because when we look at ourselves honestly, we conclude, "God could never use someone like me. Look at all the stuff in my own life." So we hang back. We do not offer ourselves. We say, "Let me fix myself first. Let me work on myself before I step out." And ten years later, twenty years later, we still are not fixed, and the work God wanted to do through us never got done.

The Altar of Uncut Stone

There is a strange little instruction in the book of Exodus that unlocks all of this. God is telling His people how to build an altar.

An altar of earth you shall make for Me... And if you make Me an altar of stone, you shall not build it of hewn stone; for if you use your tool on it, you have profaned it.

Exodus 20:24-25

Read that again. God says, do not bring Me a stone you have chiseled and shaped and smoothed with your own tools. Bring Me the stone uncut. The moment you take your instruments to it, trying to make it presentable, you have ruined it for My purposes. God wanted the rough, unfinished, unimpressive rock — the one nobody would choose — placed on His altar just as it was.

Why? Because it was never the stone's beauty that mattered. It was what happened once the offering was laid on it and the fire of God fell. When the blood of the sacrifice covered that ugly, uncut stone, it was washed clean, and God Himself came down and filled it. The stone did not qualify itself. It simply made itself available, and God did the rest — in full public view of everyone watching.

Here is the truth that ought to set you free: no one has ever been good enough for God to come and dwell in them. You will never be good enough. That was never the plan. To imagine you could improve yourself enough to earn the anointing is not humility — it is a kind of pride. It assumes the work of making you usable is your work to do. But this is not difficult work; it is impossible work, even for the best of us. Only the blood of Jesus makes a person fit to carry the fire of God.

The People God Actually Used

If you are not convinced, look at who God chose all through Scripture. He did not wait for prim and proper people who looked the part. He reached for the flawed, the broken, the overlooked.

• He used Rahab — and she was still a harlot when He used her.
• He used David, with all his emotional turmoil and his very public failures.
• He used Isaiah, a man who confessed he had unclean lips.
• He used Paul, a man full of weakness, fears, and insecurities.
• He used Elijah, a man of like passions with us, who ran from one woman and asked God to take his life.
• He used Peter, right after Peter had sworn under oath that he never knew Jesus.
• He used Jonah, who was unwilling and running the other way in the first place.
• He used David's mighty men — outcasts, debtors, the distressed, men other men had thrown away.

God does not build His kingdom out of people who merely look like leaders and talk like leaders and act the part. He uses ordinary people, forgotten on the backside of the wilderness, who are driven by their own weakness and inadequacy straight into His presence for help. The Bible puts it plainly: God keeps His treasure in earthen vessels, so that the excellency of the power may be seen to be of God and not of us.

But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellency of the power may be of God, and not of us.

2 Corinthians 4:7

Notice something. When these people prayed hard and fasted and studied, it was not that their striving earned them God's favor. It was the other way around. Because God was already using them — uncut stones that they were — they were driven to more prayer, more hunger, more dependence. They wanted God to keep shaping them by His fire. Their devotion was the fruit of being used, not the price of it.

Stop Waiting. Step Out.

So here is the invitation. Show up. Be available. Come to God honestly and say, "Lord, I have anger issues. I have things in my life that are not sorted out. But I want to be used by You." That is the person God uses. Not the one who has arrived, but the one who is willing to be placed on the altar as they are.

Somebody reading this is going to lead — not because you are best suited, not because you have the perfect home or perfect marriage or perfect children, but simply because you are the uncut stone God has chosen. Step out and let the fire fall. Someone else is the one through whom a word of encouragement will come to this house — not because you are the most spiritual or know the most Scripture, but because God chose you. Someone else will pray for the sick and see God move, even while you are still wrestling with your own struggles. You are not the wisest. You do not have it all together. Step out anyway, and let the fire fall on the uncut stone.

Do not sit around waiting for some special message before you move. Stephen, in the book of Acts, did not get a special vision before he was set apart to serve tables. He simply happened to be one of the most available. And it was in that place of service, driven by their own sense of weakness, that people were pushed toward more prayer, more dependence, more of God — until it looked from the outside as if God used them because of what they were doing. In reality, they were doing all of that because God was already using them.

Honor the Ones Who Stepped Out

One more word. If you are going to hold back yourself, at least do not sit where you are and point fingers at the ones who did step out — in all their imperfections. It is easy to talk and criticize the crooked stone placed there in front of everyone. But God says, "Touch not Mine anointed, and do My prophets no harm." We honor the men and women God has chosen to honor, precisely because none of them were flawless. Every one of them was a rough stone God decided to fill.

So who is the person God uses? It is the one whom God chooses and who accepts being chosen — even when he or she is nothing more than a crooked, uncut stone. It is the one on whom the fire will fall and the anointing will come. It is the one who says, "Here I am — a person of unclean lips — but send me." If that is the cry rising in your heart right now, then you are exactly the kind of person God has been looking for all along. Do not fix yourself first. Bring the stone uncut, lay it on the altar, and let the fire of God fall on you today.