Category Archives: Christianity

[I got this in email. I don’t know who the author is. CtH]

It was chilly in Manhattan but warm inside the Starbucks shop on 51st Street and Broadway, just a skip up from Times Square. Early November weather in New York City holds only the slightest hint of the bitter chill of late December and January, but it’s enough to send the masses crowding indoors to vie for available space and warmth.

For a musician, it’s the most lucrative Starbucks location in the world, I’m told, and consequently, the tips can be substantial if you play your tunes right. Apparently, we were striking all the right chords that night, because our basket was almost overflowing. It was a fun, low-pressure gig. I was playing keyboard and singing backup for my friend who also added rhythm with an arsenal of percussion instruments. We mostly did pop songs from the ’40s to the ’90s with a few original tunes thrown in. During our emotional rendition of the classic, “If You Don’t Know Me by Now,” I noticed a lady sitting in one of the lounge chairs across from me. She was swaying to the beat and singing along.

After the tune was over, she approached me. “I apologize for singing along on that song. Did it bother you?” she asked. “No,” I replied. “We love it when the audience joins in. Would you like to sing up front on the next selection?” To my delight, she accepted my invitation.

“What are you in the mood to sing?” I said.

“Do you know any hymns?”

Hymns? This woman didn’t know who she was dealing with. I cut my teeth on hymns. Before I was even born, I was going to church. I gave our guest singer a knowing look.

“Name one.”

“Oh, I don’t know. There are so many good ones. You pick one.”

“Okay,” I replied. “How about ‘His Eye is on the Sparrow’?”

My new friend was silent, her eyes averted. Then she fixed her eyes on mine again and said, “Yeah. Let’s do that one.” She slowly nodded her head, put down her purse, straightened her jacket and faced the center of the shop. With my two-bar setup, she began to sing.

Why should I be discouraged?

Why should the shadows come?

The audience of coffee drinkers was transfixed. Even the gurgling noises of the cappuccino machine ceased as the employees stopped what they were doing to listen. The song rose to its conclusion.

I sing because I’m happy;

I sing because I’m free.

For His eye is on the sparrow

And I know He watches me.

When the last note was sung, the applause crescendoed to a deafening roar that would have rivaled a sold-out crowd at Carnegie Hall. Embarrassed, the woman tried to shout over the din, “Oh, y’all go back to your coffee! I didn’t come in here to do a concert! I just came in here to get somethin’ to drink, just like you!” But the ovation continued.

I embraced my new friend. “You, my dear, have made my whole year! That was beautiful!”

“Well, it’s funny that you picked that particular hymn,” she said.

“Why is that?”

“Well,” she hesitated again. “That was my daughter’s favorite song.”

“Really!” I exclaimed.

“Yes,” she said, and then grabbed my hands. By this time, the applause had subsided and it was business as usual.

“She was 16. She died of a brain tumor last week.”

I said the first thing that found its way through my stunned silence.

“Are you going to be okay?”

She smiled through tear-filled eyes and squeezed my hands. “I’m gonna be okay. I’ve just got to keep trusting the Lord and singing his songs, and everything’s gonna be just fine.”

She picked up her bag, gave me her card, and then she was gone.

Was it just a coincidence that we happened to be singing in that particular coffee shop on that particular November night? Coincidence that this wonderful lady just happened to walk into that particular shop? Coincidence that of all the hymns to choose from, I just happened to pick the very hymn that was the favorite of her daughter, who had died just the week before?

I refuse to believe it.

God has been arranging encounters in human history since the beginning of time, and it’s no stretch for me to imagine that God could reach into a coffee shop in midtown Manhattan and turn an ordinary gig into a revival. It was a great reminder that if we keep trusting God and singing the songs, everything’s gonna be okay.

My niece responded to my Miracles Thread blog with this delightful true story and gave permission for me to share it with all y’all.

I was in my first year of grad school and had finished with morning classes. Generally, I went straight to my on-campus job, but for some reason, I went home that day and I heard the message Dad had left on my answering machine.

He was on a business trip that wasn’t supposed to put him anywhere near me, but his flight had been changed at the last minute, so he would be stopping over briefly at an airport about 100 miles from my campus.

Being Dad, he added, “Now don’t drive 100 mph to get there! If it doesn’t work out, don’t worry!” By the time I received the message, Dad’s plane was boarding, so I did not know if this would all work out. Nonetheless, I was going to try to take the opportunity.

So, I called work, and despite my giving them less than 20 minutes notice, they said it was not a problem if I took the afternoon off!

I did not have a car that year, but there was a shuttle company in town which took people to the airport. Generally, you would schedule your rides several weeks in advance to allow them time to map out the best route. Still, I called, and they said that they just happened to have space for me on a shuttle that would be passing my apartment in 20 minutes!

When Dad got off the plane, I was there to greet him, and we enjoyed the unexpected gift of lunch together. When I think of the four “small miracles” that all happened in a short space of time to make that lunch happen, I have to marvel at how tender and personal God’s love for us is.

This story reminded me of something similar from my own grad school days.

I showed up to a late morning class only to find a sign on the door that it had been cancelled. Having a few hours unexpectedly free, I decided to treat myself to lunch at a little bagel shop I liked.

While I was waiting for my order, I heard a familiar voice from my past … my first steady boyfriend was sitting on the other side of the room! I hadn’t seen him since he graduated from high school a year ahead of me, so this was … mmm … seven years later? Something like that.

I called to him and we decided to eat at the same table and catch up. He quickly steered the conversation to the Big Thing that was on his mind … faith.

His only sister, with whom he was especially close, had become a Born Again Christian and was encouraging him to do the same. But he also had a lot of friends who were into Buddhism and he felt torn.

He asked me what I thought and I said I’d lay the two side by side and pick the one that was better.

He acted rather offended at the idea that one might be better than the other.

I replied that if you’re going to commit your entire life to a particular path, shouldn’t it be the best one you can find?

He nodded thoughtfully and we parted on that note. I don’t know what choices he made for his life, but I have often wondered just how much organizing our guardian angels had to do to put us in that bagel shop at the exact same time that day!

I was very touched by Aussie’s willingness to share her family story. I want to open up the garden to anyone who has personal faith stories to share.

I’ve got quite a few of my own, so am thinking this is just the first … second, if you count https://polination.wordpress.com/2013/08/09/mysterious-priest-performs-miracle-at-site-of-mercedes-crash/ in what may become a series.

And … hey … don’t limit yourself to personal stories. If you have links, post them! I heartily believe that these stories do not distract us or take us away from Jesus, but rather bolster our faith and help us to know, love and serve Him ever more closely.

Here’s the tale of something that happened to me one time back in 1998.

One day, someone didn’t set the latch properly and our front door swung open. We had been warned when we adopted a retired racing greyhound that she must never be off a leash, except in a fenced area. Especially not around cars! But no one else was home to stop Star from venturing out to explore the neighborhood.

I was at home, but sound asleep … at least until the smoke alarm outside my bedroom started blatting at weird intervals and for different lengths of time. It never does that. If something sets it off, it just GOES until someone manually resets it or removes the battery.

The only other noise it makes is a “low battery” alert, which is a soft cricket-y kind of chirp that repeats at perfectly even intervals for days until the battery actually dies or someone finally replaces it.

But what I heard that morning and what woke me up and drove me out of bed before I was ready was the loud blat sound that the alarm makes when it has been set off by smoke.

Except that it wasn’t continuous. In fact, it was a lot like someone jabbing impatiently at a doorbell trying to get someone to answer the door.

I thought the low battery alert had malfunctioned and tried putting my head under the pillow and wishing it would stop! It didn’t. And it was LOUD, so sighing deeply, I got up.

As I trudged down the hall in search of caffeine, I noticed a breeze on my ankles. Looking left into the foyer, I was surprised to see the door hanging wide open and appalled to see our beautiful (but admittedly dumber-than-dirt) greyhound out in the road!

I figured I’d best make a good show of being happy to see her, so as to lure her indoors again. So I stood in the doorway, slapping my thighs and shouting “Good puppy want a treat?!” in my squeaky “let’s play” voice. She came lolloping inside to get her Milk Bone, very pleased with herself and quite tired out from her adventure.

I closed the door – PROPERLY this time – thankful that she hadn’t been harmed.

After liberal applications of caffeine and carbs, I finally got myself awake enough to think about changing the battery in the alarm. Oddly, it had stopped blatting quite soon after I had decided I really was not going to get one more minute of sleep that morning.

I got a fresh battery, dragged a chair down the hall, and popped the cover off. Instead of finding a dying battery tucked snugly into the holder, I suddenly had loose, battery-free wires dangling in my face.

Puzzled, I put the new battery in, successfully tested the alarm and replaced the cover.

When Dearest came home later on, I asked if the smoke alarm by our bedroom was hard-wired into the house’s electrical system. He said that our smoke alarms are all battery-operated, because it’s safer. If a fire starts in the electrical system, it can short out a hard-wired alarm and make it useless.

I told him what had happened and that there had been no battery in that alarm. He reminded me that he had removed the battery, because his long, steamy showers kept setting it off.

I love the big, dramatic stories where something or someone pulls off a miraculous life-saving rescue. But some of my favorites are the small stories, like the one about Star and the smoke alarm. It touches my heart that God and His servants care about the little things.

Besides, I just get such a kick out of imagining my guardian angel poking at our battery-less smoke alarm in order to drag me out of bed. I bet he was snickering the whole time, too!

August 4, 2013: Emergency workers and community members in eastern Missouri are not sure what to make of a mystery priest who showed up at a critical accident scene Sunday morning and whose prayer seemed to change life-threatening events for the positive.

Even odder, the black-garbed priest does not appear in any of the nearly 70 photos of the scene of the accident in which a 19-year-old girl almost died.

No one knows the priest and he vanished without a word, said Raymond Reed, fire chief of New London, Mo.

“I think it’s a miracle,” Reed said. “I would say whether it was an angel that was sent to us in the form of a priest or a priest that became our angel, I don’t know. Either way, I’m good with it.”

Carla Churchill Lentz, mother of the teen who was critically injured, said emergency workers have told her there is no way her daughter should have lived inside such a mangled car.

Source:

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/08/07/angel-crash-missouri/2630227/