The Hen, the Calf and the Wagon: A Farmer Who Learned His Own Heart
Drawn from the teaching of Professor Gary S. Maxey · 2 min read
Professor Gary Maxey tells a story in his book on the Highway of Holiness that makes readers laugh and then wince. It comes from John T. Hatfield, a nineteenth-century American evangelist. Hatfield wrote a book called Thirty-Three Years a Live Wire.
A real conversion
Hatfield was born again in 1872. He describes it as light flooding his soul and a burden rolling away. For eight years afterward, he says, he battled against what he called inward sin and never heard a word about deliverance from it.
His problem was anger. He wrote that in the forest or at church he could pray down fire. Yet at home and on the farm he lost patience.
Three scenes
In the first, he tried to make a stubborn hen sit on her eggs. He was gentle, then less gentle, then rough. By the end of the argument, he says, the hen was almost stripped of feathers and the eggs were broken.
In the second, he tried to teach a calf to drink from a bucket. He lost his temper, upset his wife and threatened the animal.
In the third, he drove off to church without his wife because she was late. In the pew he felt small and guilty. He went home and asked her to forgive him.
Hatfield recognized in each scene that he did not yet have the blessing of a pure heart.
What happened next
His pastor attended a holiness camp meeting and returned changed. He preached on a second, definite cleansing work of grace. Hatfield found the sermons uncomfortable. He became hungry and told his wife he would seek the blessing or die seeking it. In time he testified to a cleansed heart and said he walked in freedom from those tempers for more than thirty years.
Why Professor Maxey tells it
He says Hatfield's story is a clear example of illumination. His anger had always been there. It took repeated embarrassments for him to see it plainly. Professor Maxey adds that the account matches his own experience.
Apply it
Look for your hen. Where do you lose your temper at home with people or things that do not matter? That is often where God is shining his light. Ask him what he wants to show you there.
Drawn from the teaching of Professor Gary S. Maxey.
