Unprayed Answers

Thinking back over my life, I wonder how many folks would have prayed for me to receive the blessings that God has given me?

I think back to my younger days. I was working in my chosen profession and was moving up. I wasn't just a security guard; I was a security supervisor. I had a wife and I was making more money than I had ever made before. All was going well. Then a coworker that decided he didn't like me started spreading false stories about me. Eventually I was fired ... days after my wife told me she was pregnant. Oh, good! Hunting around for a quick answer, I landed in an Air Force recruiting office and took off with a job I would never have chosen for myself, but that ended up my actual profession and the best thing I could have done -- electronics.

I think about the time when I left the military with a golden opportunity for work. I traveled across the country with family in tow to accept the position promised me. When I got there, there was no job. Well, I muddled about and searched for whatever I could find and called one in a newspaper. They invited me for an interview. During the interview, they asked, "Where did you hear about us?" I told them I had answered a newspaper ad. They told me they hadn't put an ad in the paper. I worked for that company for 14 years. The job started me as an electronics technician and took me to test engineer with the skills I needed to have the position I now have.

I think about the time my I came home from work and my wife told me she was leaving me for another man. I argued and wept and cajoled and fretted, but she left. I was packing up the house to move to smaller quarters and came across some stuff I had written years before. God handed it to me to remind me that He was in charge, that nothing happened that He hadn't planned, that He would see me through. My wife divorced me because I was boring, but I am married now to a woman who loves me for who I am, perfectly suited to me. We fit together like hand and glove. I couldn't even imagine someone better.

Many of the biggest and best things that have happened to me in my life have been, on the face, unpleasant events. They turned me to God first and, from there, to better things than I could have dreamed. They pushed me out of my comfort zones and into God's marvelous plan for my life. The thing is, I am relatively certain that no one would have prayed for these things for me. "Dear Lord," someone would have prayed with earnest, "please take away Stan's good job. Please get him falsely fired. Please strip away any underpinnings he might have and move him on." "Dear heavenly Father," another would have said, "out of your great love for my friend, Stan, please take him out of the security of the military, move his family across country with the promise of a good job, and disappoint him bitterly." Or how about, "Jesus, I lift to you my brother, Stan. He is married with children. Please take that away. Teach him to cling to you by stripping off the mother of his children. Because of Your mercy and love, in order to honor your Name, break up his family and home. Thank you, Lord."

My life is full of unprayed answers, twists and turns that looked horrible but, as promised, worked together for good. I don't expect that anyone asked for those things for me, even remotely. Nor would I hope that anyone would. But it is very heartwarming to know that God is Sovereign, that every event in life is orchestrated by His command, and that He, not I or even my well-meaning friends and family, is the King.