You can listen to this week’s Devotional here
Evidence of Things Not Seen
Author: Nancy Wade
Life is a series of natural and spontaneous changes. Don’t resist them – that only creates sorrow. Let reality be reality. Let things flow naturally forward in whatever way they like. Lao Tzu
Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.
Hebrews 11:1 KJV
A spontaneous discussion among a few members of the writing group brought up an interesting topic a few weeks ago: If we are truly a people of faith, then why worry? If we really believe that God provides all things, we wondered, then why don’t we just stop ruminating and worrying about the outcomes of events and the actions of people in our lives? Won’t things turn out the way they are supposed to?
Before retirement, I worked in the human resources department of a local scientific research organization. My bailiwick was all things related to hiring and employment.
Over time, it became clear to me that our labs might benefit from access to temporary employees, mostly clerical, who could fill in when regular employees were on vacation or maternity leave or during times when workloads increased. And so I created an in-house temporary pool by hiring a few qualified people who I could slot into openings as needed. These folks were paid only for the hours they worked; they received no benefits, but they enjoyed a flexible schedule and could accept or decline assignments at will. During the many years this pool existed, I would go on to hire a dozen employees, including computer programmers and kitchen staff.
Often, I would receive a request for help when I had no one available to work. Or so it seemed.
What administering this temp pool taught me was that – in this situation – if I waited and watched, more often than not, as soon as there was an opening in one lab, an individual would be released from an assignment in another lab and I could assign them to the new opening. My patience was quite often rewarded. This happened so frequently that I never worried about who I would place in a new assignment. My supervisor was mystified. How on earth did I know that someone would become available, she wanted to know. “It just all works out,” I told her. “You just have to have a little faith.”
My temp pool reminds me of the writers of weekly devotionals at First Cong. Several years ago, when Chris asked me to find members of our congregation to write devotionals, I tended to track people down in committee meetings or at coffee hour after church. That worked well enough but then I realized that the Sign-Up Genius software might be a better solution. Now, I send quarterly emails to about 35 regular writers who then sign up for specific dates. Every once in a while, I will have a gap in the schedule and fortunately, there are a few writers whom I can call on a short deadline to produce a good devotional. But more often than not, a new writer or someone I haven’t heard from in awhile will call me and ask if there’s an opening. “I just had a thought and I want to write about it,” they will say. Or someone will stop me at church to say, “I didn’t think I knew how to write a devotional, but I guess the spirit moved me to write. Can I send it to you?”
I never say no. I have faith that everything will turn out just fine. And it almost always does.
God of the Universe: Help us to have faith that things will flow naturally forward in whatever way they like. Create in us the acceptance to know that all things will work out for the best. Amen
