Four Disappointments

Posted on April 12, 2015 by Margaret

On Wednesdays I get to play with Emerald until 8:30 pm while Birgitta attends classes, and though there’s lots to do at “MeeMee’s house,” sometimes it’s fun to go elsewhere. Last Wednesday we decided to head for a Michigan City McDonald’s where we’ve often enjoyed a kiddie playland. Emerald’s “Auntie Weezi,” who lives nearby, agreed to meet us there.

We arrived a few minutes early, so I decided to catch up on texting while Emerald played in the driver’s seat, her new fascination. It wasn’t 5 minutes before Louisa arrived, and we went in. But what a surprise to find the entire Playland had been torn down in preparation for remodeling. That was disappointment #1.

Heading back to the car to seek other entertainment, we discovered my battery was dead. Emerald had turned on the headlights during her playtime behind the wheel. Disappointment #2.

But Weezi saved the day! Unbelievably, she had jumper cables in her trunk, so all we needed was someone to hook them up. (We both knew approximately what to do, but a little knowledge is a dangerous thing.)

As we stood between the two cars eyeing people coming and going, a cable-angel appeared out of nowhere, a young man in a navy pea coat.

“Do you know anything about jumping cars?” I asked.

“Sure,” he said, taking the cables from Weezi.

But when he clicked them together, they didn’t spark. “I don’t think they’re any good,” he said. Disappointment #3.

“Could we try anyway?” I said, hoping God would somehow energize the cables just this once. But our cable-angel was right. They were, indeed, dead. Disappointment #4.

“I’ll find someone with good cables,” he said, heading toward McDonalds. “Really?” we said, but within two minutes, he and a uniformed McDonalds employee emerged waving car keys.

“In my trunk!” the employee said, retrieving his cables and bringing them over. When my car sprung to life, Louisa and I applauded, but the cable-angel brushed it off like it was nothing.

“Wait,” I said, reaching for my purse. “Let us give you something.”

“Absolutely not,” he said, walking back toward McDonalds.

“Can’t we at least buy you a burger?” I said, waving a bill at him.

“Nope. Glad to help!” he said, disappearing inside.

Standing between our purring cars, we realized that his one good deed had obliterated our four disappointments. And how good it felt to be on the receiving end of an unexpected blessing.

Of course the take-away is that we ought to be doing the same for others. Though playing the part of an angel is inconvenient, being a blessing to a needy person makes both parties feel pretty good. And surely it must bless God, too.

Emerald never saw a playland, but she had some good fun in my driver’s seat. And the dead battery that resulted brought some good fun to Louisa and me, too.

“A good man brings good things out of the good stored up in him.” (Matthew 12:35)

A-maze-ing

Posted on April 9, 2015 by Margaret

When I was a kid, one of summertime’s greatest pleasures was visiting an amusement park. Although no one had yet heard of Six Flags, the Chicago area had Riverview, and southwest Michigan had Silver Beach. We took advantage of both places as often as our parents would let us. It helped that even the best rides cost only a quarter, and on five-cent day, they were all a nickel.

Though we loved the roller coasters best, both parks offered all kinds of other excitement. One had a free-fall ride called the Parachutes with nothing more than a flat swing-seat and a limp chain to keep us from tumbling out. The other had a Fun House with a slide several stories high.

We also got a kick out of sitting on a flat disk the size of a living room that spun so fast not one rider could fight centrifugal force enough to stay on. Kids flew off at high speed onto carpet that gave them lots of pink rug burns — battle wounds, we’d say.

Something else both places offered was a Maze. Made with a dazzling array of sheeted glass and mirror, they fooled even the cautious. I learned by experience that over-confidence in a maze was a sure-fire way to go home with a goose-egg on your forehead.

These mazes were put together with their panels set at 45-degree angles, confusing us further by our own reflections, not just in front of us but in back, on the side, and “way over there.” It’s the perfect definition of “meeting yourself com- ing and going.” But we paid to get lost in them again and again.

Once in a while life itself seems like a maze, especially when it comes to making important decisions. The process can be much like finding our way through an amusement park maze: part frustration, part fascination. Just when we’re sure we see the way out, we slam into a dead-end…. sometimes with consequences far more damaging than goose-eggs.

So how are we to make wise choices?

By questioning God. But when we ask him, “Is it this or that?” we should be prepared to hear, “The other.”

God doesn’t do things conventionally, because he’s got ideas that would knock our socks off if he showed us all at once. So when we ask for decision-help, his guidance may not make immediate sense. That’s because he’s already way down the road in front of us, like a friend in a mirrored maze who we see but have no idea how to get to.

The important thing is that God isn’t out to deceive us the way maze designers are. His desire is just the opposite of theirs, not to trap us but to move us in an orderly way toward the good conclusion he has in mind. And as we trust his wisdom over our own, he’ll even get us there without any goose-eggs.

“Show me the way I should go, for to you I entrust my life.” (Psalm 143:8)

Timed Right

Posted on April 6, 2015 by Margaret

This afternoon I made my way to a local eye-care facility to check my vision. It’d been 4 years, and I thought it was the responsible thing to do.

Walking into the building, I counted 72 chairs in the waiting room, about half of which were occupied. How long would it be before my name was called? But then I saw a big airport-style electronic board that gave me a clue.

As I sat down, it was encouraging to see that my doctor was running “on time.” The reassurance produced by those two words made me wish there was a similar screen I could check in reference to my communications with God. Once I’ve asked for his help through prayer, my next thought always is, “I wonder when he’ll answer.” An electronic board of “wait times” would be a big help.

Through the years I’ve heard countless sermons about the Lord’s timing. I’ve been told he’s never late with his answers to prayer but that he’s seldom early. In other words, he’s always right on time.

I’ve also heard that it’s unacceptable to bargain with God based on what we hope will happen when. In other words, we’re not to pray the calendar: ”Lord, if you’ll do ‘that’ for me by ‘this’ date, then I’ll do ‘the other thing’ for you.”

This is a demand masquerading as a prayer request and displeases God. So our only choice is to spell out the desires of our hearts (which he encourages) and then find a chair in God’s waiting room. Days pass –sometimes years– without anything happening, and we wonder if it’s true that God is never late.

A wise Bible teacher once told me to watch carefully for God’s timing of events, because it’s never without significance. Considering that, it probably isn’t wise to plead with God to act sooner rather than later. Might the end-result be disappointing if he decides to give us what we want by answering “now,” when he had intended something much better for “later?”

Put in that context, impatient waiting comes with a loss. God is in charge of the calendar and controls all of time. We know that from two episodes in Scripture when he (1) made the sun stand still, and (2) caused the sun’s shadow to move backwards on Hezekiah’s 15 steps…. not to mention his involvement “in the beginning” when he created time in the first place.

So as we’re tempted to wonder what’s keeping him so long, we should weigh all the options. In the end, our best deal is to wait without complaint. And you never know; today I got called from the waiting room well before I thought I would. And sometimes God does that, too.