Day 5: Stories of Joy pt.2

To see more posts in this series just click on the label "31 Days" under the title of each post in this series, or go back to Day 1 where each day is listed at the bottom of the post.

As I was writing the first part of this post, I was reminded of a story that I was going to tell in August about a shoe (I'm not getting off topic, I promise).  And since that would have made my post impossibly long, I decided to split it into 2 parts.

Since graduating from college and moving back to PA, I've been missing one of a pair of really cute green shoes.  I thought it fell out of my car while I was packing to move out of my college apartment, and therefore lost forever somewhere in VA.  I saved the other shoe, but in July of this year, I picked that shoe up and contemplated throwing it away.  I thought I would never get another opportunity to wear it.  Instead, I threw it back in the pile and said I would do it another time.

One morning in August, I was listening to a podcast (I can't exactly remember what it was called) that was about God's love for us.  Earlier that morning (like super early, 2am), I had been praying, asking for more understanding of God's love for me.  I know that God loves me, but I don't know, ya know?  Anyway... as I was listening to that podcast, I was just hit with a revelation of how much God loves me.  I was blown away, I was completely amazed.  And then the phone rang.

It was my mom.  My sister and her had been cleaning out one of the cars (my sister's car broke and she needed another one to get to work).  So a little back story, at the end of my senior year of college my car broke down on the way home (in the left lane of a busy highway!!) for Easter break.  So I had to take a different car back down to finish out the school year.  So that was the car they were cleaning out when they found... my shoe!!  Hidden in the trunk in a crack where I never would have looked!  Again, I was blown away, I didn't know what to say.  I bounced around my kitchen a few times and then I sank down to my knees, wanting to weep with joy and shout at the same time.

How did I go from a broken-down car, to a missing shoe, to another broken-down car, to a found shoe?  I didn't even know that I was waiting to find my shoe, but somehow it all makes sense now.  It was such a simple thing, but it was something that God worked out in just the right timing.  And the result was pure joy.

Even as I wait for other life things to happen, I can still be filled with joy by the small things that usually go unnoticed.  I can be filled with joy over the changing of the fall leaves and the briskness to the fall air.  And the sunrises and sunsets of fall that are always spectacular, and never fail to fill my heart with awe and thankfulness.