Have you ever had a series of events take place that you just knew God orchestrated? Something that has happened to you that had the fingerprints of the Almighty all over it?
Last June, I was reading an article by Mary DeMuth about building a “platform” as a writer. One of the ways that she shared was to write a column for your local newspaper. I immediately thought, “Yea, right. There is no way I am going to write a religion column for the Free Lance-Star.”
About ten minutes after reading Mary’s article, I walked out to get the mail. Each week, we get a free copy of the paper and it just happened to come that day. The children were actually playing quietly (which doesn’t happen often) when I got back to the house, so I decided to relax a minute and read the paper.
When I opened it up, I could not believe my eyes. There was a full-page article announcing that the religion columnist, an older Baptist preacher, was stepping aside. When I told a friend this story she said, “Did you take your shoes off because you were standing on holy ground?”
I literally said aloud, “Okay, God. I get it.” I ran over to the computer, looked up the editor of the religion section and sent off an email letting her know that I wanted to be the new religion columnist.
After lots of prayer, writing samples, and weeks of back and forth emails, I am officially a religion columnist for Fredericksburg’s Free Lance-Star newspaper! I got up early this morning so I could get a copy (okay, I bought more than one) of my first bi-weekly column.
As I opened the paper and saw my precious words on this page, I whispered teary-eyed prayers of thanksgiving.
When I answered God’s call to share the message of His great love through writing and speaking over a year ago, I prayed this prayer:
God, I will knock on the doors, but it is up to You to open them for me. I will not go beating them down or try to accomplish things of my own accord. If you have something for me to do, please make it clear and pave the way to make it happen.
I am definitely guilty of thinking that I know what God’s will is and then forcing circumstances to make what I think should happen a reality. As you can imagine, things can get very ugly, very quickly. I have to constantly remind myself to leave it up to Him to open the doors before faithfully walking through them.
I want to always remember this example of Him clearly guiding my steps and the beautiful gift that came as a result of being obedient.
It would be so encouraging to hear your stories of God opening doors for you. When in your life have your experienced a series of events that were undeniably orchestrated by God?
