This Little Light of Mine

This is a story of how a little inconvenience and prayer made for what I call a "God situation."

Two weeks ago my beautiful and entertaining new roommate Katie came home one day from running errands around town because she couldn't seem to find her wallet. After searching the house and her car she just couldn't seem to find it. So I did what my mother used to do with me, I sat her down and had her walk me through the last time she can remember having the wallet in her hand. Your mama ever do that with you?

After reliving her day she came to the conclusion that when she went to get gas the night before, in haste she put the wallet on the top of her car and forgot about it when she got back in the car (at least it wasn't a baby, right?!?! seriously, that has happened). 

Hopeful she went back to the gas station to see if it was still there.

Nope. Life can't ever be that simple.

Discouraged, we prayed that someone responsible and honest would find the wallet and return it seeing as it had all her cards in it (student id, brand new license and debit card), her brand new check book, pictures, gift cards, her whole life, etc. You get the point. The situation sucked big time.

You know that feeling you have when you're missing something but just can't seem to find it? Well that pretty much is what Katie faced for the next day and a half. I joked with her one evening that I felt like things were going to start showing up one card at a time. She didn't find that too humorous. Well thanks to the wonderful world of Facebook someone contacted Katie and told her that they had found her Liberty University ID. As she jumped around I just smiled and said "one card at a time."

She quickly called the man back and explained that she had already ordered a new one but thanked him for contacting her. She found out that he had found the card on the busy road near the gas station Katie had lost her wallet at.

Trying to be a good roommate I volunteered to go search the road with her. We walked up and down the side of the road where we thought he had found the card but found nothing and returned home defeated.

I was washing the dishes when I heard the doorbell ring. Katie and I looked at each other as if to say did you invite someone over? I laughed and said "hey wouldn't it be funny if your wallet was at the door?" (Ok so maybe I'm not the funniest person ever).

Funny thing, it was the man that had originally found her LU ID. He had found her checkbook and wanted to drop it off! She graciously thanked him and got a better location of where the items were found.

Long story short we decided to head back out to roam the open road and see if we could find anything else. It was dark and I had to get up early the next morning to drive home but if it was me I would want someone with me so I volunteered to go with her again. This time I tackled one side and she tackled the grassy median. Two minutes in despite not seeing well she found a business card (she knew it was hers because it was from back home, MA). She held it up in the air like she had won the lottery and yelled for me. I decided to play Frogger (I'm sure mom would have freaked if she saw us running about the street at nine o'clock at night- don't worry we played safe!) and went for the center. Here was two white girls climbing around in the median at 9:30 at night with cars racing around us. I heard someone else's voice so I looked up and there was this older woman coming at us with this intensely large metal flashlight. Offering her flashlight services she began searching with us.

Thirty minutes later all three of us had walked up and down Timberlake road just talking briefly and finding cards ever so often. 

At the end of the night we had found almost everything, minus the wallet, debit card, and license (ok the big things but at least we found some important things!). Katie and I hugged Brenda and thanked her for her time. She gave us her number and said she would love to have us over sometime, seeing as we both are far from home she could be like our adopted grandmother.

Katie and I got in the car and I couldn't help but smile. Unbeknownst to Katie I had prayed to God a few days prior to her loosing her wallet that this summer He would help me establish relationships with complete strangers with the goal in mind that the majority would be non-Christians so that they could see Christ through me. Some may not see it this way but I believe Brenda was the beginning of the answer to that prayer.

Was loosing her wallet an inconvenience for Katie? Heck yes. But even Katie said had she not lost it, had Pete not found the card and contacted her, had we not gone back out in the pitch dark we would not have met Brenda. Brenda is this vivacious sixty something year old who cracked me up when she explained that she kept the heavy duty flashlight in her van in case someone tried to attack her because in her words: "I'm a nice Christian lady but if someone attacks me and its between me or them unfortunately I'm going to whoop them." We got a glimpse into her life that was centered on God and her grandchildren. In the brief minutes we talked she opened up about loosing her oldest son, 39 and frankly it just sounded like she needed some people in her life to talk to. Brenda's flashlight shed a whole new light on the situation in a sense.

Do I believe that God sent Brenda into our lives for a reason? You better believe it. I don't know exactly all the reasons why right now but God doesn't always give us the whys. Sometimes He just gives us opportunities, especially if we pray for them. 

I'm not so sure who reads this but if you are I'm going to challenge you to pray boldly for God to give you the opportunity to ------ (you fill in the blank). You'd be surprised at how God answers when we're willing. What's your God situation going to look like?