Kansas, Montana, and Times Square

As you can see from today’s pictures I’m not in the mountains of Montana. A year ago I lost my voice for a month to a strange virus. I had been scheduled to speak at a National Conference attended by hundreds of the leading CIOs in corporate America in Dallas. These tech savey IT experts are pioneers in the ever changing landscape of their huge organizations. I can see a smile on your face thinking about me, a Sport Psychologist, in a room full of technology geniuses. Only God. So their leader rescheduled me to come this year to their gathering in NewYork City at the Marriott Marque on Time Square. 

So as I was preparing my talk the evening before the Lord took me out of my comfort zone and had me focus on the “selfless” part of “greatness” for these leaders. It turned out to hit a chord with them. While they were unaware, it came straight from Jesus words, “the greatest is the servant.” 

The following morning, the leader of the conference asked me to share a message of faith in an optional session for anyone wanting to come. As I was heading to the talk the Lord promoted me again. This time to share a life changing experience that I had 30 years ago in the middle of Kansas. I was hunting with a friend when his dog, who was bred to hunt quail, broke command and went rogue, opting for a moldy ham hanging from a rope in a tree just above a coyote trap. The trap snapped onto her leg as a gruesome scene insued. We ran several hundred yard toward the blood curdling yelps from Susie, John’s trapped dog. Instinctively John crammed his hand in the rusty trap miraculously freeing Susie, but trapping himself miles from the truck. The circulation was cut off in his hand and he was in severe pain. It took several minutes for me to figure out the mechanism to free him. He was left with a severely damaged hand from the rusty teeth of the trap. I carried his shotgun as we headed for the car to get to a doctor. All the while, Susie, limped through the field with her nose pressed against his knee, glancing up in awe at her master who freed her from the pain of a bad choice. She wasn’t interested in hunting, she was consumed by awe. 

I trailed behind this scene as the Lord downloaded the parable that I was witnessing in real time. Jesus came to free us from the trap set for us. He put himself in our place, taking our pain, shame, and guilt. Later that month we hunted again because John also forgave Susie who never broke command again. The awe of her master consumed her attention. That is the short version.

After sharing this story at the morning event, a female CIO exec, came up sharing that her husband had died the year before. She let me know that the timing of the message was what she desperately needed to hear this day. And that’s when I realized, she missed last year’s conference as did I. Our Father’s timing is always perfect. He works out the timing and the message with precision when our hearts need it most.

And so on this particular day, a 30 year old experience from a long forgotten stubble field in the middle of nowhere Kansas, was shared to a bunch of tech execs by a sport psychologist flying to Time Square from Montana. In 1973 Jesus took the wheel on my journey leading me on this sacred journey of awe. Today another “Susie” was freed from a trap.

“It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery.”
- Galatians 5:1