Wednesday December 7

Christmas 1984, Tammy and I had been married just over a year.  I was working at First National Bank downtown Shreveport.  That year the bank bought a new wreath to hang on front of the Main Office building.  The old wreath was just going to be thrown away, so I asked for it.  

It was a large commercial wreath on a metal frame at least 10' across.  It was weather worn, but all the lights were still working.  I removed the lights from the wreath and used them in the azalea bushes in front of our small home in Shady Grove.  

That next week I came home from work -- plugged in my lights, but most of them were not working.  When I began to investigate, I found that many of the bulbs were missing.  These commercial grade lights had hung on a wreath for years on a building downtown without a single bulb ever missing.  But now, just a few days on my azalea bushes, there were numerous bulbs missing from most every string.  

It puzzled me.  I  began digging through the leaves beneath the azalea bushes attempting to find the missing bulbs - but not a single bulb was anywhere to be seen.  They had not just come loose and fallen out for some unknown reason.  No, they were absolutely missing -- gone -- not there at all.

It was a cold, damp, Louisiana day.  In all my digging looking for the missing bulbs, I did not realize that my wedding band had slipped off my finger - until after I had given up attempting to solve the mystery of the missing bulbs.  

I went into panic mode.  It was not an expensive band, but that was not the point.  It's value was not in how much we had paid for it - but in what it represented.  At that point I did not care about the missing bulbs from the Christmas lights I had gotten for free.  I was on my hands and knees crawling around my front yard, praying desperately, asking the Father to help me find my wedding band.  

I had been crawling, praying, looking for 30 minutes or so when "he" walked up.  "He" being the brat kid from next door.  He was about 11 or 12, loud, destructive, obnoxious brat.  He had terrorized our poor dog on more than one occasion.  

Here I am crawling around the front yard, praying out loud -- not caring who saw or heard.   And this brat  kid walks up and asked what I was doing.  Without even looking up, I began telling him how I came home to find bulbs missing from my Christmas lights and in the process of looking for the bulbs I had lost my wedding ring.  And not caring if he was standing there, as I continued to crawl around the front yard desperately searching, I began praying again (pretty emotionally) for God to help me find my ring

And believe it or not:  with the brat kid still standing there watching me -- I found my ring nestled deep in the St. Augustine grass of our front lawn.  And just as emotional, I began to thank God for helping me find my ring.

It had to have been a very funny sight.  And I'm aware that in the eternal scope of things and in light of the major issues around the planet, my need wasn't that major at all.  But to me at that moment, my issue was extremely important.   What continues to baffle me is that even when what concerns me isn't that big of an issue -- my Father is concerned about what concerns me.  That even in the mundane, the routine, the "little things" He is continually looking for reasons to "show Himself strong" in my behalf (2 Chronicles 16:9).  While I am immensely grateful for the mountain moving major miracles of God in my life - it is in the numerous small things that He continually confirms how much He loves and values me.

Oh, the end of the story:  about an hour later, I went out to remove the non-working strings of lights from the azalea bushes -- and right beside the front porch were all the missing bulbs in a nice little pile.   My guess is that the neighbor kid was the one who had taken them.  But even if that is the case, even for him to bring every one of them back is pretty amazing too, don't you think?  

They were just free used Christmas lights, but that night, as I admired them all working again - they were a confirmation of how much the Father is concerned even about the little things.   

Father, today, I celebrate this awareness anew.  

I gratefully will acknowledge Your hand at work even in the routine and the ordinary events of today. 

I am overwhelmed, amazed at Your love and concern.   

I thank You, I celebrate You, I rejoice in the confidence of Your incredible, never-ending love.