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On
February 15, 2002 a remarkable thing happened in Cincinnati,
Ohio: a twelve hundred pound cow found herself in the stockyard
of the King Mays Meat Packing Company. The terrified animal
could see the butchers sharpening their knives. She looked around
at her situation, and (with my paraphrase) asked, "Lord,
have mercy on me; what have I gotten myself into?" Ole
Bessie could smell death, destruction, and an end to all of
her dreams. She bleated and moaned like everyone else around.
It seemed all the cows knew what they were up against. They
seemed to discuss it and the general consensus was "We
are just finished. There is no way out. Surely God does not
love us. We are going to die." Can't you feel poor ole
Bessie's pain?
Have any of you ever found yourself in a situation like this? You did not cause it; you did not want it; you did not know why it came or where it came from. It became the worst of your worst nightmare! Bessie suddenly decided to think differently from the rest of the cows. She looked around in despair. She did not blame anybody. No one was there to encourage her, but Bessie decided to do something. She looked at her obstacles, her circumstances, and she saw an opportunity. In a mad wild scheme, with her twelve hundred pound body she did the impossible. In a mad rush she took off and jumped a six foot fence! For those of you who are not familiar with a twelve hundred pound anatomy, it is impossible for a cow to jump a six foot fence. Their legs are not designed for that. They have short legs and a heavy body. They just cannot do it. But Bessie did not know that. Her adversity produced power in her, and the bad circumstance she found herself in gave her courage. Authorities were stunned. Those who had planned to butcher her were shocked. They said, "A cow cannot jump a fence." But Bessie, she just went and did it! The entire city of Cincinnati anxiously followed the story. For over a week that gutsy bovine eluded everybody that tried to find her. They could not find her; they could not catch her. Finally, word got out and the animal rights activists waded in on her behalf; a woman by the name of Marg Shock offered her a home. She was finally caught by the authorities. This is not the end of the story. The meat packers did not get Bessie. Instead, because of her tenacity and her refusal to give up in the face of adversity, Bessie now lives on a beautiful farm in upstate New York. She is the absolute poster girl for every cow in America. She beat all the odds because she did the impossible, and today her life will never be the same. This is a true story and as rumor has it, if you listen closely in the meadows of that upstate New York farm, you might hear Bessie singing "Free at last, free at last, thank God Almighty, I am free at last!" © I am sure Bessie never thought she could get over that fence, and neither did anyone else. But when she saw the slaughter house, something rose up in her. Her adversity became the stepping stone; she stepped in, stepped out, and stepped up. STEPPING IN We must step in to adverse circumstances. What looks like an obstacle can become a stepping stone; but we must step in to successfully overcome the obstacle. We need to step out of our comfort zone. Opportunity usually comes in unfamiliar territory. Adversities are for advancement. Adversaries and adversities are not barricades, but stepping stones chiseled out of the experience of hard circumstances. They provide stepping stones that lead up to a divine destiny. Nobody thought Bessie could get over the fence, but Bessie had to do something. She stepped in to adversity, stepped out of familiar territory, and as a result she stepped up to a different level. |