Thanksgiving day. Many of us pause and reflect on our lives and consider how blessed we are and what we are thankful for. We did this at our family dinner today. I told everyone I'm thankful for retirement and for family being 15 minutes away, instead of 3 1/2 hours.
I didn't lie; this is true. After deeper reflection this evening, however, I have found more to be thankful for. Please bear with me while I share a story with you.
For most of my life through 26 years ago, I was not really an organized person. I struggled all through the years my children were growing up, barely keeping up with everything, and most of the time I felt very inadequate. Because of my own upbringing, I had extremely low self-esteem. I compared myself with everyone I knew, before there was social media, which causes a lot of us to feel like we come up short these days if we let it. I don't think I would have done as well as I did if I'd had immediate access to everything we have today. My fragile self-image would have shattered.
Also, a very important bit of info to note is that, though I grew up in church I did not accept Jesus as my Savior until I was 39. My children were teenagers by then.
By the grace of God, I started a new job at the beginning of the school year in 1995, and I had a decent job at last.
So in February of 1996, just a little over a year after I accepted Christ, the situation was this: my children were teens and one was actually already in college. My marriage was barely hanging on by a thread, but I had a steady, decently paying job, which in hindsight I see now was a gift from God, and an integral part of His plan for me.
And then, on February 28, my mother suddenly died. It was devastating, but for now I'm going to focus on something very practical regarding the whole situation. It was also a very emotional time of course, but this is where the miracle comes in.
Suddenly, I had all the arrangements to make for her funeral and for going through all her possessions. All this was up to me because just 3 months before, my only brother had also died suddenly. It was all up to me.
After the funeral I had three weeks to get her apartment cleaned out and the key turned in.
I remember sitting there, alone in that apartment, and praying for God to help me. I had no idea what to do or where to start. I was a 41-year-old mother of three and had very poor organizational skills. I was not prepared nor equipped for what lay ahead of me. However, I am certain that what happened after that prayer was a God thing. I believe that after that prayer, He gave me the ability and enabled me to do what I needed to do.
The answer came in several stages. I know now that all of this was God directing me, even though it just came to me as an idea. First, it occurred to me to start at the door of the room I was in and consider each thing, one at a time as I worked. I felt like I should go around the room and tackle each thing. I simply obeyed God's leading and did exactly that. I may have been in shock; I don't remember many other details about that time of my life. This was probably for the best, because I needed to set emotions aside and work on the task at hand.
Sometimes extreme adversity that seems like it will break us is exactly what God uses to equip us for what He has planned for us.
Every day for 3 weeks I worked all day at my job and then went to my mother's apartment to work on going through her stuff. At one point, as I started to encounter a LOT of pictures everywhere (my dad had been a photographer, so there were tons of them), the thought came to me that I should get three large plastic containers and sort the pictures into them by approximate time periods: 1) very old pictures, 2) pictures of my childhood era, and 3) pictures that were more current.
The only explanation for how I was able to accomplish this is it was a miracle. I feel like God put the organizational skill into me that I needed to complete the task at hand. I went through all her stuff, sorting and organizing as if I were a professional organizer. I suddenly just knew how to proceed when faced with a house full of my mother's personal belongings. I had never been able to do that before in my life! But I was doing it, AND I was able to do it without crumbling into a million pieces emotionally.
That is a miracle, in my opinion.
I rented a storage building and put her furniture and the things I had boxed up into it, with plans to have a garage sale in the spring when it warmed up. I know I had to have had help to move all that furniture, but I have no memory of that at all. None.
Two months later, in April 1996, an F3 tornado ripped through our town and tore the roof partly off the storage building where all my mother's stuff was. When we were finally allowed in, I found most of it ruined, but the photos were unharmed because I had felt strongly that the pictures should be in waterproof containers.
This is no coincidence. It was GOD. He is the only possible explanation of how I could do what I did.
As far as the furniture went, I just had to consider most of it a loss. I was so thankful that I had put the pictures and sentimental items into plastic containers.
I told this story to encourage someone today. I have really felt strongly for several days that I had to share this story of how I became organized, a life skill that has served me well ever since that emergency time that I was facing a mountain with no way to move it. I believe God gave me the ability. I was a mess back then, and yet God worked a miracle to equip me for what He knew I would have to do. To this very day, I am still extremely organized.
I am SO thankful for what He did for me during that very hard, stressful time in my life all those years ago.
I didn't really want to share this, it seemed silly to me that anyone would be interested, but the feeling that I had to was strong, so I did.
Someone reading this needs to know that God is willing and waiting to help if you will only ask. There may be a mountain in front of you, but He will show you what needs to be done and equip you for the task, whatever it is. It doesn't have to be the same type of help He gave me. It may be something completely different, but you feel you aren't up for the task. You can't do it unless He equips you.
He did it for me 26 years ago, and He will do it for you. You are not alone. He is right beside you.
God is our refuge and strength, A very ready help in trouble. Psalm 46:1
