A Unique Find

My granddaughter, Caitie, moved into a new home about a month ago. She and her husband had some trees cut down in the back yard that were leaning dangerously toward the house. While they were cleaning up some of the leftover brush, they found a class ring.

Once back inside the house, Caitie found a name engraved on the inside. The ring was from the Class of 1986 from Seton Catholic Central High School. Google provided the phone number of the school in Binghamton, NY. The school Secretary referred Caitie to the Alumni Association who listened to her story and took her contact information.

After doing some research, the Alumni Association found an address and phone number connected with this guy in his school records. The problem - the phone number was for his mother and from 1986. When the representative from the Alumni Association called the number, amazingly, the student’s mother answered.

She called Caitie and Caitie told the story again. Being satisfied this wasn’t some kind of scam, his mother gave Caitie his number. Oddly enough, he only lives about an hour and a half away. Caitie called him and told her story one more time. He was amazed. Caitie arranged to meet him and his family last Friday.

He told her the ring was lost twenty years ago. He went swimming at a pool in New York. He had the ring on when he went into the pool and when he got out the ring was gone. He looked all over the pool for the ring, but when he couldn’t find it, he assumed it was sucked into a drain. There is no explanation for how the ring got from a swimming pool in New York to her backyard in North Carolina. He has never been to this area.

This is a great lesson in hope, a never-give-up kind of hope. I recently talked to a woman who had been praying for healing for her husband for five years. Rather than give up on her quest for an answer to her prayer, she just said, “God hasn’t answered me - yet.”

In the Bible, the book of Romans tells us, “For in hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what is seen? But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.”  Romans 8:24-25 ESV

How quickly do you give up on your dreams and prayers? What kind of a time limit do you put on God to work out all the myriad details it takes to make your prayer request happen – one year, five, ten? I hope these two stories will encourage you to let God work in His time and in His way to provide His best for you.

Have a blessed and joy-filled day-

Cathy