Unexpected Appointment

I am usually out the door early to catch a run before the heat of the day and my excuses catch up with me.  

Except this morning.  For some reason, I lingered after my morning reading.  Even fully dressed, shoes on, water bottle filled, I swept the kitchen floor.  Where did that come from?  I don't know why.  And then I left before the flood of other undone things could grab my attention.  Our sequence of events is not always chronological.....or logical.

It was not that I felt like I was falling behind, but navigating a different time table this morning.  I turned into the park entrance and noticed a number of cars in the parking lot, largely because it was later than I usually arrive.  As I pulled under the big tree to park, suddenly a friend of mine popped out of the car next to mine.  I haven't seen her in a while.

"Wow," I said.  "We couldn't have timed that more perfectly. Are you walking?" I asked her.

"Yes, I am waiting for a friend.  She should have been here by now," she remarked.  And then, my upbeat and outgoing friend uncharacteristically said, "I am not looking forward to this.  The last time I met her, she was overwhelming.  It was hard.  She was so difficult. I am afraid it will happen again."

A large SUV pulled into the remaining parking spot.  It was her friend.

There was no time.  I had no advice.  But I knew what I could do.  In the remaining seconds while her friend approached, I whispered to her, "I'll pray."  My friend introduced us, and then, I took off for my run in an opposite direction.

I chuckled at God's timing which is always perfect.  Those unexpected appointments-- "just happened to run into" moments-- never take God by surprise, but fulfill His eternal purposes, even in ways we may never realize.  For some deep reason, this situation was too strong for my friend, not something she could handle on her own but only by His strength and power and wisdom.  Prayer always brings the supernatural into a situation and produces a radically different path or outcome.

God's divine encounters are never random occurrences.  His faithfulness exceeds circumstances. The pieces do not just fit together in some curious way or another, but designed and engineered with precision, planting a seed, covering a gap, filling an immediate need that far exceeds our vision.

I prayed for my friend while I ran. 

And when I finished, she had already texted me:  "Delightful.  Easy.  Healing." 

An unexpected appointment.  An unexpected result.  The first bold step of reconciliation, the door now open for something new and affirming.

Never hesitate to ask for others to pray. Never hesitate to pray for others. It is part of what fellowship is all about to lift up one another in time of need and support each other in supernatural dimensions.  Something radically different is put into action, God is part of the equation, whether we see it now or not yet.

The prayer of a righteous 

         availeth much.

                  James 5. 16