Tuesday, June 24, 2008

Coincidence?

Several posts ago (Isn't Anything Too Trivial For God?) I posted about coincidence, prayer, life micromanagement and such. Now two things have happened:

One - I was making dinner and for some reason started thinking about my parents, their deteriorating health, my son's very close relationship with my father. I started feeling all teary imagining having to inform my son when my dad dies, I can't imagine how he'll react, I wondered if he may even do something drastic to escape the grief.
Well, there was no real reason to be feeling like this, yes it will happen, maybe soon, hopefully not. But I was feeling so teary and upset that I walked outside so that neither of my boys would come down and ask me what was wrong in case I actually told them. Know what I walked out to find? A little eight year old boy was heading out into traffic to kill himself, his friends were crying and scared. (He's "okay" now, I stayed until the kids got his mother.)
Doesn't it sound like that was directed?

Then another coincidence, much smaller. My son was asking for a name for a game he was playing, I said Melinda. I don't know anyone by that name, it's just a name out of life in general, one I didn't think he would have used yet. Then I turned the page in the book I was reading - a new character named Melinda was introduced! Coincidence sometimes IS just coincidence. Of course, if I meet a Melinda in the next few days I may change my mind entirely...

2 comments:

  1. No coincidences :)

    As Mordechai told his cousin Esther, "and who knows if you have not achieved royal position for just such a time as this?"

    There are times when we find ourselves in a position where only we can make a difference.

    Who knows if you were not thinking about your father at just that time so that you would go outside for just that situation?

    Did you think of Melinda just out of the blue? Perhaps. Or maybe God was leading you to that name.

    I believe that God is working in our lives today just as much as He worked in the lives of our ancestors and will continue to do so in the lives of our children after us.

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  2. Powerful story about the little boy. God is good.
    About the name...Before we knew my wife was pregnant with our fourth child, our daughter was telling people that she was going to have a baby sister named Sarah. It turns out my wife was pregnant with a little girl. Of course, we had to name her Sarah.

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