As a Christian I believe that my life is in God’s hands and that He puts me where He wants me, as long as I am willing to obey. Sometimes He puts me in the right place at the right time so that I can receive a blessing. Other times He puts me where I can be a blessing to others. Last week He put me in one of those situations where I am certain that His plan was for me to serve Him when someone else was truly in need.
It all began with the recent cold snap, during which the facilities team at my day job had difficulties dealing with a rebellious heating control system. As MLK Day was drawing to a close, the day job sent out a text asking all nonessential personnel to work from home the next day. This meant rescheduling a meeting, which wasn’t a problem, except that one of the other person wanted to meet face to face and could only fit me in on Wednesday. I normally work from home on Wednesdays but in this case I was outranked. So I took the Wednesday time slot, making sure I had my winter coat ready.
It was still really cold Wednesday morning, which forced me to change my routine. Usually when I go into the office I take the train down the William H. Gray III -30th Street Station in Philadelphia and then I take a thirteen minute walk down to the building where my office is located. But I’m not a fan of the cold, especially when the weather people are calling it a dangerous cold. So that day, instead of walking I took an underground train that runs through the middle of downtown.
When I stepped into the train car I noticed what looked like a homeless person in a wheelchair. In Philly this is not an odd sight, so I simply continued to mind my own business. As we approached my stop, the person in the wheelchair moved over in front of the door that I had planned to use to get off of the train. My first thought was to move to another door but something told me that I should stay where I was.
When the door opened, the man in the wheelchair moved forward and I followed, giving him the space he needed to get off of the train. Unfortunately the front wheels of his chair got stuck in the gap between the train and the platform and as he tried to move, one of the wheels turned so that it was going in the same direction as the gap. I quickly realized that the wheel was going to drop down into the gap which would have caused his chair to pitch forward, so I reached out and caught the frame of the chair, holding it and its passenger up while pushing the man off of the train. He was thankful for my help and I was glad that I had not moved to another door.
Before that moment I saw the cold and the rescheduled meeting as simply a part of the normal course of life. After I sat down in my office, it occurred to me that I was in the right place at the right time in order to prevent what might have been a serious accident. That is when I realized that everything that happened that morning, as well as the day before, was orchestrated to make sure I was there to help that man. Yes, it could just be a coincidence but I’ve had so many of these kinds of coincidences that I am convinced that this was God’s plan.
My prayer is that I will be more aware of what God is doing in my life. I pray the same for you in your life as our Creator works to reveal His love and compassion to you and to those around you.
