There Are No Such Things as Accidents in Life

My sister Joann was having shoulder surgery. Not major surgery they say, but any surgery is major surgery. Our bodies were not meant to be cut open. But we do it, and it works.
I live in Nashville, and with my job and crazy schedule I was not able to be with her to help out in any way.
So I called to my hometown of St. Cloud, Minnesota where Joann still resides with her family, to order flowers for her...that was the least that I could do to help cheer her up as she recovered.
I looked online for florists in the St. Cloud area. I called a number of them and asked if they were local florists and then I hit on one that was locally owned. Being a small business owner I try to support the hometown businesses.
A lovely voice answered the phone and reassured me that they are a local business, founded by the woman on the other end of the phone.
I placed my order - a cheery bouquet of autumn flowers..."And how much do you want to spend?"
I inquired as to how much it would cost for a nice arrangement.
"$35.00", she said.
Okay, that sounded reasonable.
"What do you want the card to read?"

Those were the magic words.
First I said to just put...'Wishing you a speedy recovery'.

"No,no. Put 'Praying for a speedy recovery'."

I heard the voice at the other end whisper, "Ahhh..."

I gently interjected, "We pray together all of the time."
"You do?"
"Oh yes, I became a Christian about seven years ago at Willow Creek Church in Chicago, where I lived until two years ago, and I learned how to pray out loud. My sister gave her life to Christ when she was visiting me at Willow about five years ago, and we are connected at the heart in ways we never could have been before that."

For the next 10-20-30-40 or who-knows-how-long minutes, this wonderful lady with the open heart and I talked on the phone about the wonderful God that we serve. We shared our prayer life, we talked about our wounds, and then...yes, we prayed over that distance that had just closed. In that instant that lady from the locally-owned flower shop, entered my heart and was in that room with me.
Before we hesitantly hung up, she asked me if I would keep her and her husband in my prayers. You see, they are seeing a counselor because life got heavy, and their relationship was struggling.
I reassured her that I would and I hung up, feeling, no! knowing that this phone call for the flowers for my sister was not an accident. I could feel the smile of God enter my office, and a glow seemed to permeate the room

Oh, but the miracle didn't stop there.

Later that day a groggy, but drug-induced voice called me to squeal a thank you for the wonderful flowers that graced her kitchen table.
Before I could ask her for a verbal picture of the bouquet, she started to gush that she 'has never seen a more gorgeous arrangement in her life!"
Okay, so tomorrow when she was in her own mind, minus drugs, the flowers would go back to being a 'nice' arrangement.
Then her daughter came on the phone and proceeded to tell me that she was going to take a picture of the flowers on her phone to send to me, but the THREE-FOOT high arrangement was so big that it looked far away when she snapped the picture! And she said she had never seen beauty like she was seeing in those flowers!

Three foot high? Stunning arrangement? $35.00?!!
And then she didn't even take a credit card...she sent me a bill in the mail! In 2008!! It felt so...trusting!

God never ceases to amaze me.

I called to order flowers, and somehow this seemingly simple act bound together three women who loved the Lord. HE was - and IS - the glue that binds us.
I called to order flowers, and the word PRAYING opened two hearts across the country, over telephone lines, and brought three women together.
I ordered flowers from a local florist, we connected and prayed, my sister received the biggest vase of LOVE that she has ever received in her life - from me and an unnamed child of God who gives through flowers - God's masterpiece - and in that instant that the phone line connected for that order, we were all connected (maybe, just maybe, it was set in motion before that call - but we just didn't know it yet!)

I imagine this great God of ours sitting on His throne, looking down and smiling on the three of us all in our respective homes in awe of what transpired in that short but impactful amount of time, and I can just hear his sigh as he mutters to Himself, "Ah, three women that get what life is all about, three people that are giving glory to the One that orchestrated this - and every move - in their days. They get it; they really get it!"