Opportunities

Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing. If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives generously to all without reproach, and it will be given him. But let him ask in faith, with no doubting, for the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea that is driven and tossed by the wind. For that person must not suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord; he is a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways. Let the lowly brother boast in his exaltation, and the rich in his humiliation, because like a flower of the grass he will pass away. For the sun rises with its scorching heat and withers the grass; its flower falls, and its beauty perishes. So also will the rich man fade away in the midst of his pursuits. (James 1:2-11 ESV). One day a lady pulled into a self-serve gas station to fill up her car. She got out of her car, hurried over to the pump, lifted the nozzle to her gas tank, and tried to pump the gas. Nothing happened. Belatedly she realized that this was one of those gas stations where you had to prepay. Frustrated and in a hurry, she ran inside, paid the cashier, and returned to her car to resume pumping her gas. She squeezed the handle, but still nothing happened. "What kind of lousy gas station is this?" she mumbled angrily to herself. After trying again with no better results, she ran back in to the cashier and started giving him a piece of her mind. With a concerned look on his face, the cashier talked right over the top of the lady's scolding. "Ma'am, please stay right here. Don't go back to your car. I just called 911. When you were leaving the building after paying me, I saw a man get into the back seat of your car. It looked to me like he didn't belong there. The only way I could get you to come back inside was to turn off your gas pump." Just then the police pulled up and took into custody the man who was hiding in the woman's car. The woman learned later that he was trying to get initiated into a very dangerous gang. Armed with a knife, he had planned to kill her and steal her car once they left the gas station. Sometimes it’s easy to feel resentful and frustrated about a disappointment, a failure, a loss, or a serious setback of some kind. No one likes it when life doesn't go as smoothly as they'd like. At those moments consider that God may be trying to get your attention, to slow you down so that you may hear his voice. Perhaps due to our frantic pace, we don't notice sin creeping into the back seat of our lives, putting us at great risk. Thank God that he's always on the lookout for us, and that at times he uses setbacks to rescue us from danger. The trying times are really opportunities for joy!