{"id":789,"date":"2021-06-14T08:19:57","date_gmt":"2021-06-14T12:19:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/js1cd06kre.onrocket.site\/?p=789"},"modified":"2021-06-14T08:19:57","modified_gmt":"2021-06-14T12:19:57","slug":"hiding-in-plain-sight","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/2021\/06\/14\/hiding-in-plain-sight\/","title":{"rendered":"Hiding in Plain Sight"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Author and evangelist Tony Campolo was once invited to speak at a small Pentecostal college in eastern Pennsylvania.

Before the chapel service, several of the faculty members took Tony into a side room to pray with him.  Tony got down on his knees and six men put their hands on his head and began to pray.

Now Pentecostal prayers can be a bit like the Energizer bunny:  They keep going and going and going.  The longer those men prayed, the more they leaned on Campolo\u2019s bald head.  \u201cDo you feel the Spirit?\u201d one of them whispered.  Tony recalls that he definitely felt something<\/em> pressing on his neck.

One of the faculty members kept praying about a man named Charlie Stoltzfus.  \u201cOh Lord, you know Charlie Stoltzfus.  You know he is about to abandon his wife and three children.  Send an angel to bring that man back to his family. 

\u201cYou know who I\u2019m talking about, Lord\u2026Charlie Stoltzfus.  He lives down such-and-such road, about a mile on the right-hand side, in a silver house trailer.\u201d

Campolo found himself thinking, \u201cGod knows where this guy lives.  He\u2019s not up in heaven saying, \u2018Uh, could you run that address by me one more time?\u2019\u201d  Mostly Tony was just hoping at that point that he could get back up off his knees.

After the chapel talk Campolo hopped into his car and headed home.  He was approaching the Pennsylvania Turnpike when he saw a young hitchhiker.

As Campolo tells the story, he acknowledges that picking up hitchhikers is less than wise, but as a Baptist preacher he hates to pass up a captive audience.  He opened the door to his car. 

\u201cHello,\u201d he said, \u201cmy name is Tony Campolo.\u201d  \u201cHi,\u201d said the young man, \u201cmy name is Charlie Stoltzfus.\u201d

Campolo said nothing.  He drove down the turnpike, got off at the next exit, turned around, and headed back.  \u201cHey mister,\u201d said the hitchhiker, \u201cwhere are you taking me?\u201d  \u201cI\u2019m taking you home.\u201d  <\/em>\u201cWhy?\u201d \u201cBecause you just left your wife and three children, right?\u201d  \u201cThat\u2019s right!\u201d

Campolo exited the turnpike and drove straight to the silver trailer about a mile down the road \u2013 you know, the one on the right-hand side. 

\u201cHow did you know I lived here?\u201d Stoltzfus asked, thunderstruck.  With all the solemnity he could muster, Campolo turned to Charlie and said what he had always wanted to say:  \u201cGod told me!\u201d<\/em>

For the next hour Tony sat in that silver trailer with Charlie Stoltzfus and his wife.  That was the day they decided to stay together.  That was also the day they began to bet their lives that God is real.  Today Stoltzfus is himself a church leader in another state.

In case you\u2019re thinking to yourself, \u201cStuff like that never<\/em> happens to me when I\u2019m driving on the interstate,\u201d it\u2019s a certainty we\u2019ll all be stunned when we learn, in the next world, what God was up to all along. 

Even though our culture wonders aloud why God seems to be hiding, the simple truth may be that he is hiding in plain sight.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Author and evangelist Tony Campolo was once invited to speak at a small Pentecostal college in eastern Pennsylvania. Before the chapel service, several of the faculty members took Tony into a side room to pray with him.  Tony got down on his knees and six men put their hands on his head and began to pray. Now Pentecostal prayers can… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":790,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[41],"class_list":["post-789","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-guidance"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/789","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=789"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/789\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":791,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/789\/revisions\/791"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/790"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=789"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=789"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=789"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}