Yesterday Sam and I were enjoying my most favorite part of the day...Morning! We have a sweet little routine right now that makes me smile to just think about. We wake up in our little cabana and put the hot water on and have our breakfast out by the pool or inside, if it's raining :( like it was this morning. The other most favorite thing about this time is that we have been making lists...oh how I delight in lists. Just to organize all the fear in my head or things that need to be done or accomplished just feels good. In fact I went to the store with Sam and his friend Andy the other day to get a cute little notebook to write down all of our lists...and while in there I also made a friend.
I will digress, just for a moment because I am sure that this story will make a couple of you laugh. I had asked Sam to take me to get me a journal one day. Him and his friend Andy were riding motor bikes all day and then came in and took me to the little book store in town. I was instantly in heaven. I don't know what it is about book stores and the organization/journal sections and the card sections and well, just everything about book stores I just love. I was lost in the organization section where the notebooks were after wandering from the journal section while Sam and Andy were completely absorbed in the car racing magazines. As I smiled happily the clerk came by and asked if I needed help. And in typical Dana fashion I found myself chatting with him, oversharing....some how I was telling him I had just got married and am now living in NZ. The funny part of that story....well, you see it started because when he asked if I needed help I replied with, "No I just love this section and all the different things to organize." He smiled and walked away but on his way past me again he said, "You must be a Poly." To this I thought he was thinking I was a "poly tech" student (which is similar to college or trade schools in the States) So I of course replied, "No I am not at Poly I actually just recently married a Kiwi and moved her last Wednesday." It was my turn to stop him in his tracks with confusion...he chuckled and explained that "Poly" was off of their commercials. Evidently they have a "Molly" who is disorganized and a "Poly" who loves to be organized. I laughed at myself and smiled at the friendly old clerk thinking, "oh man I am in a brand new place, but it is still the same old Dana."
Back to the most favorite part of my days...after we eat breakfast together, we tend to map out our days and what needs to get done, as well as make any lists of what we need to do for our business or visa/immigration or just plain life. Yesterday I had said to Sam that we should pray and ask God to provide us a car. Then we actually forgot to pray about that...
Well, that afternoon a friend text him and offered us a car. Later that night when Sam told me I was struck by how God does know what we need even before we do. And for me, it is always such a sweet reminder to see God at work in our lives. I won't at all pretend to understand God and his ways. I think that is the beauty and frustration of following and loving God. He is so loving but never predictable. It is easy to see him as a vending machine or a sweet old clerk that is always there to serve you and meet your every whim or need, but in reality He is a loving God that sees beyond the current moment. To see God as a vending machine makes so much sense to me. We often times ask God for things that we need or even want and we see it provided. There is something so genuine and raw about that deduction. It's the times when you ask and don't see God's hand move the way you thought that become so scary and shake you at your core. I have been guilty in this last year of being that obnoxious person at the vending machine that put her "money" in and didn't get the candy she wanted and then proceeded to shake the "machine" and yell it and kick. One thinks that will make the "machine" just spit out what you want, or at the very least it will make you feel better. Neither is true, with a machine or in my experience with God. The more I screamed and kicked and yelled the less life happened. But that didn't seem to stop me...
At the end of the day I am so thankful that God isn't a vending machine. I see that in a pure way we are easily led there, but today there was such a thankful spirit I had about the last year. A simple thing like having a car offered was nice, but to me it was God reminding me that while He is not a vending machine that I can kick into giving me what I want, He is a loving Father that loves to lavish and surprise us. But it is His to choose how and when, and most likely when the "candy" doesn't come out there is a very good reason...
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