By now, you'd think I’d be accustomed to God’s wondrous ways, but he always manages to surprise me. Like last week, for example.
I was in sunny California for a Guideposts conference, which kicked off with dinner at the hotel where everyone was staying. I didn’t really know most of the people in attendance–there were only two other editors from the New York office, and they’d be busy hosting the event.
Now, I love socializing. In fact, some days I can’t keep my mouth shut–maybe I’m making up for all those years when I was a shy bookworm in high school! But when I’m around people I don’t know, I sometimes revert back to that timid teenager.
Alone in my hotel room before dinner, my mind was flooded with worries. What if I didn’t have anyone to talk to? Or, what if I spent the whole night standing awkwardly in a corner, having a fake conversation with my diet Coke? If only I had a buddy at the conference.
Please God, I prayed before leaving my room, help everything go okay!
I walked outside to the patio where the cocktail hour was being held, all nerves. But the very first face I spotted was a familiar one. Catherine Madera, a frequent Guideposts magazine contributor who I’d met a year earlier at a writer’s workshop. I wondered if she remembered me.
She was in the middle of a conversation, but as soon as I approached, she turned around like she’d been expecting me all along. “Hello, Diana!” she said warmly. “It’s so good to see you!”
I wished I could give God a big hug of gratitude. Catherine and I started chatting away like old friends and, a little later, another woman approached us.
“I’m Ty’Ann,” she said with a big smile. “I just started working at Guideposts a month ago in Connecticut.” I introduced myself, and she leaned in closer to look at my name tag.
“I actually know another Aydin,” she said. “Kristin…”
“That’s my sister!” I exclaimed.
It turned out that Ty’Ann and Kristin had worked with each other years ago at the same company. The whole evening–and all throughout dinner–Ty’Ann and I couldn’t stop talking about our “coincidental” meeting in California, which led to a number of interesting conversations with the other conference attendees at our table.
By the time I headed back to New York on Friday, I had two new friends and so many connections made.
Isn’t that just like God? He can turn even the simplest request into something so much more. I’d prayed that things would go okay, and he answered my prayer with double the wonder!
