A few weeks ago, a dear friend posted a heartwarming story on her facebook wall, so I shot her a quick fb message and asked if I could share it with you all. This week, I’ve been focusing on ways to reach out with the love of Christ, whether through prayer, a kind word, or even just taking the time to offer a smile. Last year I took an evangelism class and it really opened my eyes. I learned that the journey to faith is rarely a one time step. Often when people come to Christ, God has already been working in their lives for quite some time. Through a neighbor ten years back who baked pizzas when they returned from the hospital with a newborn. Through a mailman who offered to pray. Through a family member who consistently demonstrated patience, or even a passerby who offered a quick, “God bless you.” Often we’ll have no idea the impact our smiles, prayers, and words have…until we get to heaven.

There are three things I love about Melissa’s story:

1. God had been loving on her, drawing her closer to Himself, and preparing her heart to receive His love, for years.

2. Melissa caught a glimmer of God through the consistent witness of her cousin’s life.

3. Her teacher shared when God laid it on her heart to do so, and the timing was perfect.

One question: What if the teacher had been too busy to go to the coffee shop that day? Or too concerned about offending Melissa to hand her the gospel tract?

The next time you feel God calling you to reach out, stop and think, what if the person He’s calling you to reach out to is praying to Him right at that moment, asking Him if He’s really there, if He really cares, and if He can hear them. You might be their answer to prayer.

And my final thoughts are…when I first approached Melissa, I asked if she could share what God had been doing in her life. Her first reaction was, “Wow, I don’t know. Has He done something I’m not aware of?” But once she’d taken the time to look back, she realized God had been there all along.

Melissa’s story:

On first thought when reading this, I was thinking “Yikes, has He been moving in my life without me recognizing it?” Then I drove home for lunch in a quiet car and thought it over and it came to me clear as day. He has been moving, maybe taking small baby steps with this once skeptic, but nonetheless I am learning that none of us are on the same trek with Him now are we?

About a year ago, my relationship with my cousin Robin was rekindled. We hadn’t been in contact for nearly 30 years. My dear cousin is a true woman of God. Her spirit is always praising Him and in her faith I found something I knew was missing within myself. The more we talked, the more my path was being cleared. In May or June, I purchased my first Bible and began reading. Prayer came naturally although the prayers I send up may be a bit chaotic and jumbled, I am sure He understands and can sort it all out.

To backtrack my journey I should mention, that when I say I had been skeptical it was mostly based on what I now see as a misunderstanding in what it means to be Christian. Having never been surrounded by religion growing up, my vision was narrow, although I thought it wasn’t at the time. From my perspective, I saw “bad” things happening to “good” people. I had a person who I thought I would spend my life with taken away in death. The people I knew who were church go-ers, in my opinion were hypocrits and Sunday warriors who dropped their religion at the church door as they walked out after services. By saying these things, I don’t intend to offend anyone, but to understand my journey I must be honest.

It is with fresh eyes and an open heart that God is working through me the most right now. I am less quick to jump to judgement about another person, because I now understand more. Yes, we are all on different journeys to take us where we are meant to eventually be. I am learning that bad things will happen to good people, but it is part of a larger plan, one that I cannot see but must trust and have faith in. When you read the stories of the Bible, it is filled with those exact types of scenarios. Last year, those kind of thoughts would have never occurred to me and I would instead see only the despair and feel bitter about what I perceived as “bad”.

Once the walls that I had built which were keeping the religious at bay started crumbling, I began to notice more people being drawn to me (or perhaps me to them). In search of a church home, I began attending services at a few different churches trying to find one that fit me best. Now I am still on that search but it is one of the things I want to really focus on this year. Knowing that the more I submit myself to receiving, the more I will be able to give.

The day I bumped into my teacher, Miss Winter (Sue), felt like a culmination of God saying to me “See, I am here.” To have this woman, who was important to me so long ago, be the deliverer of a small Christmas tract about Jesus, and for me to be willing accept it – read it and for her name to be there was more than a coincidence. It felt like a true gift and I accept it.

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Jesus offers that same gift to each of us, but for it to be of value, we must accept it. What about you? Has God been working in your life? He always is at work, loving us, drawing us, guiding us. Sometimes we just need to take a moment to step back, and look back, to see His hand. When you do, you’ll find He’s been there all along.