My God of Surprises!!

Are you like me in that you sometimes think "God (!!), I'm down here struggling...are you up there listening? If you're hearing me, where the heck are ya? I need you and I can't feel you!"

Well I'll tell ya...that the last few days of my life have been well...shocking in terms of God's presence in my life! My mouth has been hanging open in amazement...and actually I've found it quite hilarious that God would send angels for things that are important to me, but frankly leave me wondering "God, there are things like world peace and Barack's to-do list...why are you helping me with this?"

Let me give you two examples in just the last four days. Here in Indy, we got huge amounts of snow early last week. Our condo's snow removal people had dutifully cleared our front walk and the sidewalk across our whole block, but the snow plows promptly dumped the street's blackened snow back over the whole area. So the morning of the Hair Ball, Ted and I looked out to try and figure out how people were going to get to our front door! Ted (IU-degreed!) shoveled a 'break' in the impasse through to the street from our front walk vs. trying to shovel the entire block! So it's around 10AM and I hear this engine-type noise. I look out to see a 20-yr-old kid snow blowing the entire block in front of our house! I couldn't believe it! I ran out to him and said to him "Do you know you're my angel today?'" and told him why we were having a party that night. He smiled but turned solemn and said..."My grandma is having chemo now too for breast cancer, so I didn't know, but now I'm glad I could help you."

The second example goes to the depths of my heart. You know my Teddy...sweet, loyal, always there for all of us. In the midst of the speed at which this has all happened upon our family and with Christmas on top of it all, I don't think my diagnosis really hit him until last week! So my most fervent prayer all along has been that God would find ways to comfort us as a couple going through this and also that God would find ways to comfort our kids. So after an all faculty meeting at IU yesterday, a prof I hardly know asked if I would come to her office for a moment. She promptly shared that she had heard about my cancer diagnosis and that she and a colleague were completing a study of how effective a particular series of 3 reading/discussion modules were in helping couples optimize their treatment journey. She said that she had leftover materials and wondered if they might help Ted and me and promptly handed me a book entitled "Breast Cancer Husband". Do you believe that?

It gets better. I asked that if Ted was OK with it, if we could still be part of the study? She replied yes, of course. I asked who the principal investigators were...to which she replied Drs. Robert Goulet and Kathy Miller...our very doctors!

So back to my first question...do you think God isn't a God of all knowing? of all listening? from snow removal to helping you find a way through the toughest challenge? Think again...and bring all your worries to Him and then wait and watch...He will be your God of Surprises too!