Divine appointment

In the early days of my return pastoring in Amador County I ran a painting business on the side, to supplement my earnings. I ultimately handed off the painting to a recovering alcoholic who worked hard for several years. However, the complete ruination of a large painting job as a result of his return to drinking resulted in my momentary brush with a total breakdown. I was scheduled to speak at Silver Lake Chapel, a rustic retreat in the mountains in a chapel overlooking a scenic lake, and I decided I needed to cancel. I was too emotionally-drained, I felt, to even preach.

But, thankfully (providentially), my wife persuaded me that the trip away for two days would be just what I needed...and she made me promise to shut down my painting business.

It was a typically beautiful summer weekend and the little chapel's setting, idyllic in every way, brought me much-needed rest and rejuvenation. The little chapel was packed, with campers seated out to the porch area in front. I am uncertain what I shared but after the service a man, a little older than me, obviously moved by the service, , approached me to tell me he had not been in church since the death of his mother as a teenager. He asked me where our church was located and said he would come and visit me sometime.

Well, that promise resulted in five families driving 45 minutes every Sunday to our services in Amador County. Two of those families have become a vital part of Grace Fellowship even to this day.

Yesterday I ate lunch with the man who approached me after that Silver Lake service. We have become good friends and he is moving out of the area to a retirement setting--out of driving distance. I felt sadness as we shared together and reminisced about the circumstances that brought us together. But I felt joy at the strengthening of his faith.

Just across the restaurant from us was a familiar face, though marked with signs of dissipation and ruin. It was the man I had hired to paint years ago who informed me he was on his way to serve nine months in the county jail for a variety of offenses. He thanked me for how I had helped him in the past. I hugged him and told him I would be praying for him...and I will undoubtedly visit him in jail.

Coincidences...or divine appointments> I know what my choice would be!

And by the way, I have never hired out for painting since I made that promise to my wife!