Monday, July 21, 2014

Accidentally, On Purpose


‘What a great guy,’ Sam remarked, slowly putting down the yellow legal sized paper with the unfamiliar handwriting. The letter had arrived earlier that day, the return address not known to us. From an early age, all our girls recognized the delight, and today the intrigue, of a handwritten envelope.

The letter was one of gratitude. Months earlier Sam had stopped to act as a witness to an accident at a busy intersection on his way home from work. He knew it would be hard to determine who was at fault without an unbiased observer. If he had been involved, he hoped someone would wait for an officer to arrive; do unto others as you would have them do unto you.

Because Sam was willing to be inconvenienced, the letter writer was not charged with the accident and he was spared the five hundred dollar deductible to repair the damage to his vehicle. The letter continued by offering if there was anything he could do to be of help, please let him know.

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A small group of ladies met in the secondary kitchen/meeting room of the large church where our whole family was very involved. A new lady arrived and joined in the discussion readily, confidently, and delightfully. ‘Please don’t let her be someone who is just visiting,’ I whispered as a silent, sincere prayer. ‘Please let her be someone who will stay.’

Afterward, after introductions, we quickly discovered we had many friends in common through a non-denominational Bible study I had been involved in and where she was acting as a substitute teaching leader. Small world, big God! What a wonderful gift to meet Leah, then later her husband Steve and their two children.

As hoped, their whole family quickly became involved and integral to the church, using their many and varied gifts to the glory of God and the joy of the people.

Months later, our associate pastor announced the move of his family to a camp ministry for the denomination. His wife and I had been praying by phone together weekly for over a year for the needs of family, neighbors, and church. The Sunday that the move was announced, Leah came to me hurriedly after the service and said she’d like to be my next prayer partner.

‘All my prayer partners always move, eventually. (But not before our hearts are lovingly entwined, I neglected to add.) Are you prepared to move in the next couple years?’

 ‘My extended family is all here. We’ve been here for many years.  I’m not going anywhere,’ she boasted.

Hmmm. We’ll see.

When, how, where should we meet to pray together?  Our children had youth and children ministry meetings on Wednesday evenings, so we decided that would be most practical. The only available space was a small copy room in the church office, so that’s where we knelt and prayed on the behalf of many and ourselves.  We marveled at God’s blessing and goodness. We also discussed openly our befuddlement at the many inexplicable circumstances of life where we found ourselves and loved ones. Determined, we held each other accountable to be hopeful and watchful for a way to be opened for resolution.

Praying for someone is a way to care for and love them, even if you never meet in person. Praying with someone is a way to cement a friendship for a lifetime, no matter how many miles separate you or how many years pass between conversations. That is the friendship we began forging, week after week, not knowing then the quality of what was being built.

Steve used his wonderful music skills to help with worship in the youth ministry and acted as a wise counselor. Soon he was either bringing our older daughters home after youth group, or we would meet him at a designated place near their home, which was on the same north end of town but still ten minutes or more from our home. To our delight, our whole families became friends with one another.

One Sunday, when their family was at our house after church for lunch, everyone scattered into various pairings for conversation as the final preparations for eating were accomplished. The men, who both traveled in their jobs, shared tales of traffic and traveling woes with one another.

Steve began sharing about an accident he had been involved in at a local busy intersection. ‘It was with an orange Mercedes, wasn’t it?’ Sam exclaimed. Steve shook his head slowly in astonishment as Sam finished the story. ‘I was the one in the car behind you who waited to give the cop my card as a witness. You even wrote me a thank you letter later! We still have it!’

Small world, big God, indeed.

I’m not a mathematician, but I know the odds for this meeting again so many years later are astronomical. And providential. And not coincidental.

Seeing God, the Arranger, at work so up close and personal in our lives made it slightly easier to say good-bye to them a couple years later when they moved to the west coast of Florida, despite Leah’s earlier adamant predictions to the contrary. Once she met me halfway, in Lakeland, when the burden I was bearing was so great that only a face to face conversation with a dear friend who would not only tell me the truth but also remind me of the Truth would suffice.

We remain friends though they are now in the northeast and we have only seen one another twice in the last five years. We don’t talk on the phone or e-mail regularly. But I’ll rearrange my life if I can visit with her for a few minutes on a layover in an Orlando airport or if she has a few spare hours when she is in town visiting family.

How wise is Leah? She once quipped that she is skeptical of reading the writing of authors who haven’t been dead for at least a hundred years! Yet, she introduced me to wise women writers as varied as Amy Carmichael, Carolyn James, and Anne Lamott.

How flexible is Leah? On the cusp of letting her nursing license lapse, she instead went back to school, eventually getting her doctorate in palliative care and teaching at a northern university. Living in Pennsylvania makes seeing the families of her beloved children and grandchildren infrequent. She longs to be nearer and to be a more ready presence in their lives.

How faithful is Leah? She has a list of ‘prodigals’ that she prays for regularly, even though only one of them has returned home to faith and family in many years. Still, she prays. Still, she hopes. Her continued regular prayers for me have mattered more than she will ever know as she trusts Him to help me avoid the sins ‘such are common to man’ and to make a difference in the sphere of influence where I live.

'You are constantly in my heart, frequently in my thoughts, and regularly in my prayers,’ was the closing of  a recent correspondence. How truly rich I am to have a friend like her.

And it all started accidently.

On purpose.

 

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