When Stubble Lasts

But exhort one another daily, while it is called To day; lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin. (Hebrews 3:13)

In our youth, much was talked about our radical salvation and obedience, most of which was not positive.

Among the most popular cliches was the one saying that a youth’s salvation is comparable to a fire fuelled by stubble.

I have also written elsewhere that when I joined the media, I was told matter-of-factly that it would not take long before I was back to the world. And there were many samples he was using to prove his point.

Yet not only did some of us survive that fallout, but we even went ahead and thrived, not only in our faith, but also in ministry.

I have used discipleship as what separated us from the rest.

But today I want us to examine another aspect that God opened my eyes recently through my farming.

When I feed goats, I will normally cut their feed into small pieces to reduce wastage.

But even then, they will not eat everything. Meaning that quite a bit gets wasted.

That is quite some stubble.

But even that stubble is not useless to the farmer.

If you burn it, it makes very good fertilizer, especially one that is resistant to the termites that ravage everything in our farms.

Once a pile of stubble is big enough, I light it so that I will later use the remains to plant trees which are most targeted by the termites.

One time I had a pile of stubble that burnt for over three days, of course not blazing all the time. It would show some evidence of a fire when I had thought that it was long dead. Yet there had even been a little drizzle one of the days.

For me it was astounding that stubble could retain its fire for so long. It was unimaginable that a stubble fire could last that long.

Yet it did, shooting a blaze once in a long while, yet a blaze all the same.

It means that a stubble fire can survive without ‘solid’ fire holders like sticks and logs.

Can that describe our faith? I am convinced so.

But exhort one another daily, while it is called To day; lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin. (Hebrews 3:13)

How does it happen?

The first reality is that the stubble was in a heap. It was not scattered all over.

It is in fellowship that stubble, which is what a young believer (or any new believer for that case) can maintain their fire.

My father told me that when they used to herd (like all pastoralists do), they used to bury an ember of some trees and they would find it ready to restart a fire months later.

There were no matches those times and so starting a fire was a difficult and complex task.

Incidentally, that was how households used to ensure a fire in the morning in my childhood. The person who did not have good firewood to ‘bury’ those embers would always be on her neighbours’ doors looking for live embers to start her fire.

Not many had access to good wood that could keep their fire overnight since it would be a collection of the sticks and stubble that could be gathered anywhere. Good firewood could only be gotten from the forest which was illegal anyway, and quite a distance.

We are talking about lasting fire from stubble. It is only that I feel that background is important.

Stubble blazes brightly and powerfully, but only for a short time. Then it dies as suddenly.

But a pile of stubble can go on for a long time.

That is why many young people have blazing faith in school or college yet are unable to keep their fire once they leave those institutions.

That is why young people in college will use their pocket money to fund, plan and go for evangelistic outreaches all over yet have a very hard time supporting ministry when they get those well-paying jobs.

Their fellowship made their stubble fire blazing. But only when that fellowship lasted.

Remove them from the fellowship and they many times become worse than the ones who had never come across the Gospel.

That is when you see a young person who was blasting their fellow believer for compromise because they maintained close friendship with their villager who was not born again gets married to a clear infidel when they leave the warmth of that fellowship.

Fellowship is vitally important for stubble as it determines who lasts and who falls by the wayside.

And let us consider one another to provoke unto love and to good works: Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is; but exhorting one another: and so much the more, as ye see the day approaching. (Hebrews 10: 24, 25)

But that is not the only reason stubble can last. But it is a key reason all the same.

Fellowship is essential to the new believer. But it has to be the fellowship of people who are seeking to grow in the knowledge and obedience to God.

A fellowship around a man or woman of God has no capacity to make stubble blaze at all since it has human instead of divine fuel.

A true man of God will focus the fellowship of those following him to the knowledge and obedience to God. He will, like John the Baptist, seek to diminish even as Christ explodes in the lives of those following him. And I have left ‘her’ intentionally.

The other reason stubble can last is the purity of their faith. It is the innocence that comes from ‘foolishly’ following whatever they know God says.

I have left discipleship out of this intentionally. I hope you will get my reason as I go on.

Why did Jesus say that we should have a child’s faith.

It is unstained by experience, stories, reasonings.

God guards that folly and innocence.

You have heard of this or the other missionary who left his mission station heartbroken because after decades of ministry, they did not get a single convert. Some even backslide because they pour the blame of their barrenness on God.

Many decades later, they learn of thriving churches that are the direct fruit of their ‘unfruitful’ ministry exertion.

How did that church grow without a Bible, teacher and many other essentials that make a church grow?

They chose Christ and followed Him according to the little knowledge the missionary had given them even in their rebellion.

They walked with the little revelation they had received and God was able to fuel that stubble with His Holy Spirit.

I have interacted with people who became believers amidst idolatry and witchcraft who were lone believers for a long time. And some of them were children or young people.

They could not have fellowship because the nearest believer was very far and they were scared of associating with someone from such a background.

But they thrived all the same.

When I was in college, I hosted a brother who was beaten and kicked out of home because he had dared to become born again in a Roman Catholic family.

I think that is the kind of faith Timothy had inherited. And it was the kind of faith Apollos possessed.

I have been invited to teach in churches that do not have Bibles, in churches where even the pastor is illiterate.

But they do not have the challenges we are battling with because of the purity of their faith.

God is interested in growing their faith even though His church is actively resistant to His call to take the requisite materials to them.

I am therefore writing this as a call and plea for you to pray and be ready to be used to make that a reality.

But they will not stop growing because we are resistant and rebellious.

They believed in Christ and so Christ will sustain and grow their faith.

Holding on to the little they know will open them to a power able to sustain their faith under whatever pressure the enemy could exert.

It is the same way Rahab the harlot and Ruth were able to connect to the faith of Israel.

That was the same way Josiah was able to bring a revival amidst certain judgment.

And the Bible is full of such characters.

From Joseph to Daniel to Obadiah in Ahab’s palace.

They thrived though they lacked the traditional means or support to even stand.

And that is the whole understanding of grace. God will give you what you need to accomplish what He has called you to be and do.

This means that there is really no excuse for sin and backsliding.

That is simply the result of the choices we make and not because of the environment we were in.

But you do not have to be stubble all your life.

You can read the Bible for yourself. You can grow through knowing God through obedience to everything He reveals to you.

You can grow to be a blazing log that can help stubble to continue blazing for Christ.

But being stubble is not a lost cause.

I was stubble. But now I am not. And it can happen to you.