How do you know God’s will?
Novemeber 28, 2005 -- Mid-Day
Is there a message in the combined events of our lives or are they just random? And if there is meaning, how can you tell what it is when the messages seem to be opposed to each other?
Over the past three months, three different firms have been asked if I would be interested in hurricane relief work in Louisiana. The first time, it turned out the firm had enough internal candidates to meet their needs. The second time the requirements seemed unreasonable and the timing conflicted with other projects I was working on. The third time, the commitment was more reasonable; the timing was exactly between projects; and the request came from a friend. I believe that God keeps putting a choice in front of you until you make the “correct” choice. Perhaps there was a special contribution I could make or perhaps there was something that I needed to learn. I said yes.
Just before Thanksgiving I was called and asked if I could be in Baton Rouge by 2:00 pm on Monday. The only available flight the company’s travel agent and I could find that would accomplish this on the “busiest travel weekend of the year” would require an overnight in Dallas. It turned out that on one of the legs all that was left was a first class seat and that for some strange reason it was less expensive to book the entire flight first class.
I called the limo company we use and reserved transportation to and from the airport. At 4:00 pm yesterday, a stretch limousine parks in front of the house. It was all they had available – no extra charge.
When I arrived at my rental car at the Baton Rouge airport, I noticed that the “temporary plate” taped to the rear window had expired. I went back to the rental desk. “Sorry for the inconvenience, we will upgrade your car for free.” And I have this car for almost a month.
A persistent request, a contract that answered my prayers for work that would meet our financial needs, and first class treatment all the way – maybe this is God’s will.
Then there is the counter evidence. I will be missing my daughter’s play this weekend – I designed the set and we were both looking forward to working together on its construction. It is something that binds us together and something we will both miss. My wife is in a panic wondering how she will be able to do everything involved with her business and the household with me being away. This is a surprise to me since I was away for three months early in the year and I thought everything worked fine – I clearly missed something.
My daughter has been having a tough time sleeping and has been crying a good deal since the trip was scheduled. The three of us had a tearful goodbye yesterday afternoon. This morning my wife called to say that our daughter was so upset that she couldn’t go to play practice after I left and had a real tough night. She wants me to come home and my wife is very concerned. Is this like the first few days when she went to camp for a month and she wanted us to come back and get her – only to be in tears when we did come back and it was time for her to come home? Should I try and make it home to see her play Saturday night or will my leaving again on Sunday make things worse and leave her unable to perform for the final show? Maybe I am supposed to be home not here?
How do you tell?
Addendum:
After writing this I opened a book by Thomas Lynch that I have been reading. The new chapter started with the following:
"Events unfold in ways that make us think of God. They achieve, in their happening, a symmetry and order that would be frightening if assigned to Chance. Things that happen here intersect with things that happen elsewhere, as if there were a plan. Coincidence makes way for correlation which, in its turn, bespeaks the intimate consortium of cause an effect – first in whispers, then in the full blushless voice of certainty: because it says, because. Eventually everything is suspect: I wash the car, it rains; she wears that perfume, he is dizzy with desire; as long as you whistle that tune no tigers appear. Ironies? Happenstance? Or is it that tune that keeps the tigers at bay? The finger of fate or of fate’s Maker that taps, deliberately, those dominoes, the tipping of which, down the ages is history. " (1)
There are no coincidences.
(1) Thomas Lynch, The Undertaking – Life studies from the dismal trade, Penguin Books, NY 1998.
Is there a message in the combined events of our lives or are they just random? And if there is meaning, how can you tell what it is when the messages seem to be opposed to each other?
Over the past three months, three different firms have been asked if I would be interested in hurricane relief work in Louisiana. The first time, it turned out the firm had enough internal candidates to meet their needs. The second time the requirements seemed unreasonable and the timing conflicted with other projects I was working on. The third time, the commitment was more reasonable; the timing was exactly between projects; and the request came from a friend. I believe that God keeps putting a choice in front of you until you make the “correct” choice. Perhaps there was a special contribution I could make or perhaps there was something that I needed to learn. I said yes.
Just before Thanksgiving I was called and asked if I could be in Baton Rouge by 2:00 pm on Monday. The only available flight the company’s travel agent and I could find that would accomplish this on the “busiest travel weekend of the year” would require an overnight in Dallas. It turned out that on one of the legs all that was left was a first class seat and that for some strange reason it was less expensive to book the entire flight first class.
I called the limo company we use and reserved transportation to and from the airport. At 4:00 pm yesterday, a stretch limousine parks in front of the house. It was all they had available – no extra charge.
When I arrived at my rental car at the Baton Rouge airport, I noticed that the “temporary plate” taped to the rear window had expired. I went back to the rental desk. “Sorry for the inconvenience, we will upgrade your car for free.” And I have this car for almost a month.
A persistent request, a contract that answered my prayers for work that would meet our financial needs, and first class treatment all the way – maybe this is God’s will.
Then there is the counter evidence. I will be missing my daughter’s play this weekend – I designed the set and we were both looking forward to working together on its construction. It is something that binds us together and something we will both miss. My wife is in a panic wondering how she will be able to do everything involved with her business and the household with me being away. This is a surprise to me since I was away for three months early in the year and I thought everything worked fine – I clearly missed something.
My daughter has been having a tough time sleeping and has been crying a good deal since the trip was scheduled. The three of us had a tearful goodbye yesterday afternoon. This morning my wife called to say that our daughter was so upset that she couldn’t go to play practice after I left and had a real tough night. She wants me to come home and my wife is very concerned. Is this like the first few days when she went to camp for a month and she wanted us to come back and get her – only to be in tears when we did come back and it was time for her to come home? Should I try and make it home to see her play Saturday night or will my leaving again on Sunday make things worse and leave her unable to perform for the final show? Maybe I am supposed to be home not here?
How do you tell?
Addendum:
After writing this I opened a book by Thomas Lynch that I have been reading. The new chapter started with the following:
"Events unfold in ways that make us think of God. They achieve, in their happening, a symmetry and order that would be frightening if assigned to Chance. Things that happen here intersect with things that happen elsewhere, as if there were a plan. Coincidence makes way for correlation which, in its turn, bespeaks the intimate consortium of cause an effect – first in whispers, then in the full blushless voice of certainty: because it says, because. Eventually everything is suspect: I wash the car, it rains; she wears that perfume, he is dizzy with desire; as long as you whistle that tune no tigers appear. Ironies? Happenstance? Or is it that tune that keeps the tigers at bay? The finger of fate or of fate’s Maker that taps, deliberately, those dominoes, the tipping of which, down the ages is history. " (1)
There are no coincidences.
(1) Thomas Lynch, The Undertaking – Life studies from the dismal trade, Penguin Books, NY 1998.
posted by J Corlss at 12:30 PM
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