I Have a Hammer...

If you looked at the tools hanging in the corner of my garage where I have a little workshop set up, you’d never know the significance of a particular old hammer. I’d bought two of the same hammers before I made my first international mission trip, a construction trip to Honduras in the mid-1990's. One hammer I planned on keeping at home, and the other I figured I’d leave in Honduras, with the rest of the tools I’d brought, to be used by the locals. Our assignment that week was to work on a cement block church building that another previous mission team had begun. In the following weeks, several other teams followed us, and eventually the community had a simple, but functional church, where there previously had been none.

Many wonderful memories are etched in my mind from the trip. We toiled in temperatures in the 90's all week, and I returned home with a rare January farmer’s tan! By then end of the week, we’d begun to see the forming of the church we were erecting. Many in the community stopped by to watch and offer their gratitude for what God was doing through us. Most of us were unskilled laborers, doing whatever the experienced carpenters, some American, some Honduran, told us to do. We were paired with same carpenters all week, effectively becoming teams of builders. My assignment during the week was to assist a Honduran brick layer named Marco. Marco was about 30 years old and spoke no English, but could lay block like a master. I fetched water, mortar, blocks, and whatever Marco needed to build the walls of that church. We bonded not only as a team of laborers, but also like a pair of brothers. You see Marco was not only a master bricklayer, he also was a follower of the Master...

One night after a hard day’s work, we held a little worship service under a lean-to next to the work site. I was giving testimony and I jokingly said "Before I start, Marco and I are going to sing a duet..." Marco immediately jumped out of his seat and started to the front. I had to stop him before I was forced to reveal why no one has ever asked me to be in the church choir. Marco just wanted the opportunity to praise God.  It was the type of attitude Marco had throughout the week. He just quietly went about his business, always wanting to please the Lord.

It’s been 13 or 14 years since I spent that week with Marco, but not a week passes that I don’t think of him. Thoughts that inevitably lead me to fulfilling a promise that Marco and I made to each other. You see, at the end of that mission trip, I gave Marco the hammer I’d brought from home. I told him I had one exactly like it at my house. We made a pact that whenever he used that hammer, he’d pray for me and my family and I would pray for him and his family whenever I used the matching one at home. I have a lot of tools, most of which I’m not very proficient with, but that yellow and black hammer hanging in my shop never fails its job of reminding me to pray for Marco. I don’t suppose you could buy it from me for any amount of money. Proverbs 27:17 tells us: "Iron sharpens iron, and one man sharpens another," and I can attest that Marco sharpened me that week, a honing that continues to this day.