Something He Can Use

Last night I had my hair cut by my friend Ari. She will graduate from cosmetology school on the 30th of this month. While she was cutting my hair though she asked me the weirdest question. She said, "Do you mind if I keep your hair?"
Needless to say I gave her a really weird look in the mirror. I mean I don't care what she does with the hair she cuts. I'm not gonna need it anymore, after all.
She went on to explain that some of her classmates needed hair to make color strands. And my hair had not been dyed so it was the best kind of hair.
So some of my hair will do some good for a cosmetology student. And I thought it had no purpose.
It really made me start thinking. I mean to me cut hair is a useless thing, but a cosmetology student can use it to learn their craft. After all, if they are gonna turn hair green, it would be much better for that hair to be a strand that had been cut off someone's head than the hair that is actually on someone's head. Something that I saw as useless has a purpose.
Lately I have heard about several people that others have deemed "useless." See, these people have imperfect pasts. They've gone too far out into sin, and the holier crowd has deemed them unworthy to do anything for God.
When I hear stories like this, it angers me. Because I know that God doesn't throw us away just because we mess up. He doesn't see us as useless pieces of trash. He sees us as something that He can use in spite of our failures.
Now, I can never put the hair I had cut off back onto my head, but it can be used in spite of the fact that it has been cut. I can never go back and undo the sins that I've done in my life, but God can use me in spite of them.
He's in the business of making things new. Abraham lied. Peter denied Christ. Paul murdered Christians. But God used all of them.
Abraham became the father of a great nation, God's chosen people. Peter preached a sermon at Pentecost where 3,000 souls were saved. Paul travelled throughout the earth preaching the Gospel of the Christ he had once rejected and ended up writing nearly half the books of the New Testament. God changed the lives and hearts of these men in a great way.
And He is still in the life changing business. He doesn't condemn us for our past (John 8:11) He makes all things new in our lives (Revelation 21:5) so that we might be used for His glory.
So, do me a favor, never say that God can't use you or somebody else just because of past failures. You never know, somebody with a past just may be the next Peter or Paul!