God's Comforting Hands

Daniel 4:3

How great are his signs! and how mighty are his wonders! his kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and his dominion is from generation to generation.

Over the last several years, I have been amazed at the number of times that God has given my family signs of comforting and confirmation when it was needed most.  I feel so honored to have the privilege of serving a God who loves and cares about His people so much that He is willing to do this for us.  I know that signs from God were not uncommon 2000+ years ago and I believe God still provides signs for us today, but many times we are too busy or distracted to recognize them.  How wonderful it is, though, when we do recognize God's signs in our lives.   

One example for my family occurred about 3 years ago.  We were in the midst of the custody battle with my parents over our children (story for another time) and were really feeling beaten down by the whole process.  We knew God was in control and that it would work out fine, but we had been put through the ringer and were just totally worn out.  We were having a particularly hard day so we decided to go out as a family to have some pizza at a local pizza place.  While we were eating we noticed a family at a nearby table kind of looking over at us nervously a few times.  We wondered why , but just ignored it and kept eating.  When they got up to leave, the man walked over kind of sheepishly and said that he had never had anything like this happen before, but he was certain God had told him to pay for our supper.  He placed a $20 bill on the table and then left.  We were so dumbstruck that I'm not even sure we said thank you.  God knew that we needed some encouragement and He used this family to show us that He was right there with us.  What a great encouragement it was!  To this day we get teary when talking about that experience. 

God has blessed us many times with these types of signs.  I am thankful to say that it has happened often enough that we are no longer dumbstruck when it happens, but are usually able to immediately recognize God's hand in the situation and praise Him for the peace that these signs bring.  Recently we made some very big decisions regarding where to live, how to best live out God's principles in our lives, what church to attend, etc.  We have felt peace about it, but for me there had been some lingering doubts about how fast we acted and what loose ends we left behind.  In the last few days all of those loose ends were neatly tied up without me really understanding why or how it happened.  It certainly wasn't through any actions that I undertook.  It was clearly God once again telling me to just follow Him and do as He directs and He will take care of the rest.  I am thankful for the encouraging signs that God sends to reassure his people that we are indeed within His will.  May each of us have the peace that comes with knowing that God alone is directing our paths.

In the Blessed Name of Jesus,