Who Knows What a Day May Bring Forth?

We had a full house at church yesterday! The warmth and camaraderie and close proximity of our neighbors created an almost gala atmosphere. The worship seemed to have a new intensity, the joyful songs and hymns ringing out loud and clear, contrary to the normal pattern of thin voices on Sunday morning. Did we set an attendance record? No, our finicky heating system in the sanctuary had chosen this frigid morning to act up, and we had no choice but to meet in the upstairs fellowship hall (the original auditorium of our bi-level church).

When my husband took the podium to lead in prayer, he was awed by the “coincidence” of similarity of the scriptures he had prepared to read and the theme of the song service. The scriptures from Psalms 33:18 -20 coincided with the words sung from “He is Mighty to Save” and others dealing with courage, mercy, trust and rejoicing. The refrain, “He has conquered the grave” resounded with the thought of v. 18-19: “Behold the eye of the Lord is upon them that fear him, upon them that hope in his mercy; to deliver their soul from death, and to keep them alive in famine."

“How many of you are on Facebook?” the pastor asked as he came to the pulpit. As several raised their hands, he went on, “How many of you looked at it this morning?" Fewer raised their hands this time. “I just want to read you what I posted early this morning in my announcement before I knew about the heating system: ‘Come expecting…It’s a new year with a new focus, but it’s the same unchanging God who has promised to meet us here!'”

And meet us He did! Last night at our Round Table study/discussion group, we were remarking on the morning service. “It turned out to be almost a treat!” I observed about the inconvenience. Our pastor’s wife gave a testimony: “I found myself saying, ‘What just happened?’ With all the realigning that had to be done, I had been stressed over whether it would get done in time. Chairs had to be set up, the musicians’ instruments had to be moved, and songs had to be gone over.” (We had heard chairs scraping, the scrambling of feet and ominous noises overhead from our Sunday School room below. She had been supervising the frenetic activity.)

“Then suddenly, it was all finished with time to spare!” she went on. “The songs had been smoothed out, everything was set up, and we were waiting on the congregation!” (Not only that, but when everyone arrived, we found a spread of donuts, rolls, coffee and other drinks set out in welcome!) We had to agree that God had intervened. The whole service seemed orchestrated by God.

It reminded me of something I had read once, called “A Modern-Day Parable.” In it, a young man had made his plans for the future, praying that God would give him a wife with brown eyes and black hair, let him live in the country, and have a boy first and then a daughter. As he looked back on these youthful thoughts from a distance of many years, he recognized that he had had a very happy life, but with a blonde, blue-eyed wife, a city dwelling, and a daughter born before his son. He asked God why He hadn’t answered his prayers in the way he had prayed. According to the parable, God answered, “I wanted to surprise you.” I think that says it all.