When God Spoke to Me in the Shoe Department...

I would love to say that God spoke to me in the shoe department and said “BUY THOSE SHOES!” but that isn’t exactly what happened.

I wasn’t going to share this little story but it has been on my mind for the last few days and I just can’t shake it. So I’ll share it…hoping it’s meant for someone else to hear.

I went to Target with Samantha a few weeks ago. Nothing unusual there…except that I had to go to the Chili Target on this particular morning. I don’t think I have ever been to the Chili Target. I’m an eastside girl. I go to Irondequoit, Marketplace or Webster…but never Chili.

But they had uniform pants I needed for Samantha for school… so off we went. As usual, I had a return to do first so Sam perused the dollar bins while waiting. We trotted to the girls department and found the pants. And then it was off to the dressing room just to make sure they fit right.

After successfully trying on the pants, we were walking toward the shoe department when she stops mid-stride and says, “My wallet! I don’t have it!” Arrrggggghhhhh!!!

I sent her back to the dressing room to look around and she came back looking distraught. I walked back with her to give a second look around. Of course there was no wallet.

Me: Are you sure you brought it into the store?

Sam: I think so!

Me: I knew you should have left it in the car! Let’s go to the service desk and report it. What was in it?

Sam: Um… $8.

Me (thinking to myself): Okay it’s only $8 and if we don’t find it, it will be OK. But this is annoying.

The woman at the service desk asked for my phone number so she could call if the wallet got turned in. I gave her our home phone number. And then I thought, “Why didn’t I give her my cell number? Ah well…” As I’m talking to the service desk employee, Sam checked the dollar bins to make sure she didn’t set it down somewhere.

We re-trace our steps through the girls department and decide to check the dressing room one more time. Between the girls department and the dressing room are the shoes. I decided to glance at the shoes while we made our way to the dressing room. While walking through shoe department I hear THE VOICE.

The voice: “You should pray.”

Me: “Yeah, I probably should pray and it would be a good example to Samantha but I’m frustrated and annoyed and I’m not gonna’ ask God for help finding the wallet of an 8 year old girl. And we’re standing in the shoe department!”

We pressed on to the dressing rooms. I spoke with the attendant and asked her to keep an eye out for it.

We purchased the pants and headed to the car, holding out hope that maybe the wallet would be sitting on her seat or something. Of course, as we got to the car, the wallet wasn’t there. I was trying (rather unsuccessfully) to contain my frustration about this. Since we are never in Chili, I’m thinking, “Oh great… if they find it I’m gonna’ have to truck back out here for it!”

Before pulling out of the parking lot, I decide I better call Paul.

Before pulling out my phone to call home, I utter a prayer in desperation, “Lord, where IS that wallet? I know you know where it is… Please help us find it!”

And then I reach into my pocket to pull out my phone. My phone is almost always in my front right pants pocket. But this time, the phone is not there… Samantha’s wallet is. It had been in my pocket the WHOLE time. I sit there humbled, once again.

I ponder this feeling humiliated and ashamed. I know God told me to pray in the shoe department and I ignored him. I’m fairly certain that if I had asked for God’s help 20 minutes earlier, when I was in the shoe department, we would have found the wallet that much more quickly and our shopping trip would have been so much more fun. I apologized to Samantha for being angry with her, and I asked God to forgive me for ignoring His voice.

The wallet just seemed too small to talk to God about… and I was so angry. 

Maybe you need to hear this today, I don't know... but whatever you need to ask God for, do it. Don’t put it off. Don’t think you can handle it on your own. Pray. Today. Now. Give it to him and even if you don’t get the answer you want immediately, you will have a sense of peace that the Creator of the Universe is watching over your needs and cares about you.

"Don’t worry about anything; instead, pray about everything.

Tell God what you need, and thank him for all he has done.

Then you will experience God’s peace,which exceeds anything we can understand."

Philippians 4:6-7

In Honor of My Husband on His 34th Birthday

I was annoyed with my husband recently. Shocking, I know. Not that I would be annoyed with Paul but “shocking” that two people who commit to sharing their lives together would ever butt heads. (This sounds like a GREAT birthday tribute so far, doesn't it?!)

Paul had been out golfing with our 6 year old, Michael. While he was gone, I cleaned our bedroom. This may not sound huge but there were piles of clothes that had been unmoved for the entire summer! I was so proud of myself for all of my efforts and I was eager to show Paul our cleaned up respite from chaos!

As he was unpacking the clubs from the car, I went to the basement to change over the laundry, only to discover that the laundry tub had overflowed and the floor was a wet mess. Frustrated I went to the sink and saw gobs of grey paint stopping up the drain.

“It figures,” I thought. “Once again, he started a project (paining the porch floor) and didn’t really clean up his mess and now there is water on the floor. Well, I’m not picking those gobs of paint out of the sink. He can do that himself. I have already cleaned our bedroom and done enough for him today. This is the thanks I get for everything I do around here!” And on and on went the thoughts in my mind as I considered everything I do each day in light of the mess on the floor.

Full of selfishness and anger, I brought him to the basement, showed him the problem, and left him there to take care of it. I didn’t bother to tell him how excited I was about the bedroom. The moment was ruined.

And then I heard it: that still, small voice that urges forgiveness for an offense. It was so clear to me. And it humbled me.

“How many more days do you have together?” said the voice in my head.

“How many more days?”

“If you live to be 85, how many more days will the two of you spend together?”

I thought about this and realized it was several thousand days. Grabbing a calculator, I figured that if we live another 50 years, it is 18,250 days to be exact.

And the voice prodded me, “If you have over eighteen thousand days together, are you going to let this one small offense ruin all of that? Are you going to let a few gobs of paint in the sink become such an unforgivable offense that you hold it against him and lose even one day together?”

I hung my head in shame. “Lord,” I prayed, “forgive me for being so selfish. Help me to forgive him and get over myself. Thank you for each day we have together.”

And with that, I joined him in the basement and apologized for my attitude. And of course, he had no idea how upset I really was. Men are like that.

So, Paul Conrow, on your birthday, let me thank you for everything you do. Thank you for loving our children and for loving me even when I can be hard to live with. I’m so grateful that God has given you to me forever. And I’m looking forward to another 18,250 days with you. Happy birthday!