Friday, February 3, 2012
Day 4
Years ago I had a
paradigm shift about prayer as I read something Elizabeth Elliott wrote:
“Dreaming is a form of praying and praying is a form of dreaming.”
All I know is this:
the more I pray the more I dream and the more I dream the more I pray. Prayer is where holy dreams are conceived by
the Spirit of God. Prayer is a dream incubator. And the bigger the dream the harder you have
to pray!
George Washington
Carver is considered of the greatest scientific minds of the twentieth
century. Around the turn of the
twentieth century, the agricultural economy of the South was suffering as the
boll weevil devastated cotton crops. The soil was being depleted of nutrients
because farmers planted cotton year in and year out. It was George Washington
Carver who introduced the concept of crop rotation. He encouraged farmers to
plant peanuts and they did. The strategy revived the soil, but farmers were frustrated
because there was no market for peanuts. Their abundant peanut crop rotted in
warehouses. When they complained to Carver, he did what he had always done.
Carver prayed about it.
Carver routinely got up at 4 AM,
walked through the woods, and asked God to reveal the mysteries of nature. He
circled Job 12:7-8: Ask the animals, and they will teach you, or the birds of
the air, and they will teach you;or speak to the earth, and it will teach you.
Carver literally asked God to reveal the mysteries of nature. And God did.
In Carver’s own words:
I said, “Lord, why did you make the
universe?”
The Lord replied,
“Ask for something more in proportion to that little mind of yours.”
“Then why did you make the earth,
Lord?” I asked.
“Your little mind
still wants to know far too much,” replied God.
“Why did you make
man, Lord?” I asked.
“Far too much. Far
too much. Ask again,” replied God.
“Explain to me why
you made plants, Lord,” I asked.
“Your little mind
still wants to know far too much.”
So I meekly asked,
“Lord, why did you make the peanut?”
And the Lord said,
“For the modest proportions of your mind, I will grant you the mystery of the
peanut. Take it inside your laboratory and separate it into water, fats, oils,
gums, resins, sugars, starches and amino acids. Then recombine these under my
three laws of compatibility, temperature and pressure. Then you will know why I
made the peanut.”
On January 20, 1921,
George Washington Carver testified before the House Ways and Means Committee on
behalf of the United Peanut Association of America. The chairman, Joseph
Fordney of Michigan, told him he had ten minutes. An hour and forty minutes
later, the committee told George Washington Carver he could come back anytime
he wanted. Carver mesmerized the committee by demonstrating dozens of uses for
the peanut. In the end Carver discovered more than three hundred uses for the
peanut. Or maybe more accurately, the Lord revealed more than three hundred
uses. They included everything from glue to shaving cream to soap to
insecticide to cosmetics to wood stains to fertilizer to linoleum to the secret
sauce in Batterson burgers: worcestershire sauce.
So the next time you shave or put on
makeup, the next time you stain the deck or fertilize your garden, the next
time you enjoy a good old-fashioned PBJ, remember that all of those things
trace back to a man who had a habit of prayer at 4 AM. They weren’t good ideas. They were God
ideas. His praying led to dreaming. And
his dreaming led to worcestershire sauce.
Mark Batterson-Circle Maker
