Over and Done

In each of the three situations, it was over and done in a matter of minutes.  The first was with a check out clerk at a grocery store.  Between checking out the groceries and waiting on the check reader, she told me how she made it here from Florida and how it was impacting her family.  The second encounter came as I was paying a bill at the utility company and I overheard the person next to me telling the woman behind the counter she was eight dollars short.  And, then in another place, as money was exchanging hands with the convenience store clerk, she told me that she had been out of work a few days because her mother had died.

 

Chance encounters?  Random conversations?  No, I think of another explanation.  Sometimes God puts us into brief moments with other people.  Maybe the moment has within it an answer to a prayer that has been prayed.  Or, maybe it is a moment for being blessed.  Or, maybe God brings two strangers together for a brief moment for reasons unknown and, perhaps, even unrecognized by either one.  While this is not the first time such has happened, I found myself remembering these moments as times for which preparation is done in time previously spent quietly in the presence of God.

In these over and done moments there is no time for doing a lot of thinking about possible responses.  There is not even time to be surprised.  It is over as quickly as it started.  It is simply a brief moment to which God brings us.  He knew about it.  He planned it.  It may surprise us, but not Him.  And, if we paid attention while we with Him in our quiet time, we might realize with some hindsight how He was preparing us for that single moment of expressing a caring heart.  Such is the only explanation which really makes sense.