Listening to the Message

Janet Stevens

If I had missed the message, I would have missed the blessing!

At 8 a.m. on that Sunday morning, I was going down the hall and into the lobby of the nursing home that my mother-in-law had been living in for several years (Alzheimer's). The trip home from Indiana to Connecticut would take 16 hours, and I was anxious to get on the road and through Thanksgiving holiday traffic. I nearly missed the elderly gentleman sitting in the chair right beside the front door. He was dressed in his Sunday best which now hung loosely on his bony frame.

Something stopped me. It was a small town - my hometown - but I didn't know him... wasn't personally known by him. In fact, I had to turn back around to go over to him. I asked him if he was waiting for someone. He answered, "No, it's just that... this is the time that I used to go to church every Sunday." Something told me that there was no other place that I was supposed to be that morning at that time. I'm not a very church-y person, but I reached out my hand to him and asked him, "Would you like me to sit here beside you and pray with you?" His face lit up and his eyes just beamed, "Would you, please?"

We sat there together for some time praying from the heart aloud and in silence, just holding hands and being together. I got up to go on my way, and he smiled his thanks. In fact, I felt that I was the one truly blessed in those few moments that I thought I had offered to someone else. If I had missed the message, I would have missed the blessing! I'll never forget that. I think that this was one of the most defining experiences in my life. To listen... to stop my own intent and listen to what God has in mind for me to do - right now, this moment... to even change my mind and turn around for God... to God. And to act in the knowledge that this is for Him, not for me. And then find out that He had meant it for me all of the time!

©2004 by Janet Stevens. All rights reserved. Distribution via e-mail, disk, print, or any other form is prohibited under U.S. copyright law without express permission of the author.