Hearing God at Work
The Young Man on the Riding Lawnmower.
Yesterday while sitting at my desk, I heard a man yelling obscenities at someone. My view was obscured by a trailer, so all I saw was a man riding on a lawn mower coming my way after the yelling was over.
I recognized the young man as he was passing in front of the office and went out to ask him what the problem was that had him in such an uproar. He told me that one of our tenants just about ran over him with his truck. As he was telling me the whole thing and just a cussing up a storm, at the same time, the tenant could be heard in the back ground shouting obscenities back at the man on the lawn mower as he talked to me.
I told the young man on the lawn mower to call the police, and then he went on down the road. Before I had even finished talking to the young man, the phone rang and the tenant whom had been just accused of assault called and began to explain his side of the story as to how the young man on the mower had tried to run over him. Again, my advice was to ‘call the police.’
A few minutes later, the young man on the mower returned to apologize for using such bad language and for cussing me out. (I never felt cussed out, but accepted his apology.) Then he left. I saw him go back and forth in front of the office a couple of times, but no other events were taking place. Things got quiet, or so I thought.
In about 15 minutes, the tenant called and said that the young man on the mower was riding back and forth in front of his trailer yelling that he was going to kill him. He proceeded to tell me that he had the ‘right to defend himself.” Ah.. I thought, those are fighting words. It was time for me to call the police.
When the police arrived, they began talking to the young man on the mower who happened to come toward the office at just the right time. I had just finished filling the officer in on what was going on and left to allow them to handle the matter without interference from me.
As I was standing in the office, I was pondering what action they might take. The other manager, was saying that we should trespass the young man on the mower. I did not want to do that. He has friends in the park and besides that, I do not have a lot of respect for the tenant that the young man was arguing with. He is an old hippie who deals in drugs but stays just out of reach from the law. There have been season when his trailer would bring in drug traffic and be the busiest place in the park all night long.
One of the things that the young man had been telling me was that he was upset that he was told to leave the park when it was the old hippie was selling drugs. He told me he did not do drugs and just wanted to visit his friends. He had asked me why I would stand up for the hippie when the hippie was the bad guy?
At the desk in the office while the officer questioned the young man, I pondered trespassing him. Clearly, my heart was not in agreement with this action. It didn’t seem that the young man really had caused any problems, and the tenant had caused problems for years. Yes, there had been accusations that this young man sold pot in the park, and that he was responsible for taking some of the items that had been stolen, but.. he seemed so nice and such a victim at this time.
As I stood there, I heard a whisper behind me saying, “You may not like the hippie, but he has the right to your protection.” As it was such a small quiet voice, and my own mind so set on ‘not’ giving favor to the hippie, I almost missed His voice.
It was about that time when the officer walked up to me and told me that to trespass this young man on the riding lawn mower, I would have to verbally tell him that he was not to come into the park. As I walked out of the office with the officer to the sidewalk where the young man was waiting with another officer, I made my decision to go ahead and trespass him from the park.
As I approached him, I heard him telling another officer, “I smoke pot, but they do meth.”
Instantly I knew I had made the right decision.
Then the officer told the young man that I was going to trespass him from the park. He told him that the tenant had the right to have protection from those who do not live in the park. This was my confirmation of what I had heard in the office. The words the officer spoke were almost word for word, and at least, exactly the same in ‘concept.’
This is an illustration of hearing the Lord give His advice in everyday issues that involve our lives. When you catch on to these things, it gives a great peace inside that you have made the right decision based upon the hearing of the Lord’s voice. When you follow His voice.. you’ve done well. That is such a wonderful feeling.
- 🦋sj 🦋