About 17 years ago I was walked into a 56 story building in downtown Dallas for a job interview.
As I was entering the building, completely focused on preparing for the interview, I heard someone call my name. I thought I imagined it, so I kept on walking.
But I heard my name again, and this time I looked around to see who it was. It turned out to be a Human Resources recruiter who happened to be the same person who helped recruit me to my previous job.
He was surprised to see me in this building, and asked why I was there. I told him I had an interview with a certain company in the building. When I shared which company it was, it so happened that he worked for the same company. He asked me who I was interviewing with and then wished me luck and went on his way.
After a couple of rounds of interviews, to my great joy, I received an offer to work for this company. I was elated and grateful. I could hardly wait to start my new job. On my first day, I ran into this same recruiter again. He congratulated me and was happy to see that I got the job.
He went on to tell me that the day I ran into him on my way to the interview, he went upstairs to his office and made a quick call to the Director over the department I was interviewing with. He informed the Director that he knew me from my previous job and went on to give me a glowing reference.
This experience was pivotal to my faith journey. I’ll never forget the way God perfectly orchestrated the encounter with this recruiter that day, which I have no doubt resulted in the job offer I received.
You see there were so many factors determining what time I would enter that building that day.
I had a 40 minute commute from home. I had to sit in bumper to bumper traffic. I had to navigate downtown Dallas to find a parking spot on a busy weekday morning….all just to walk into this high rise building at the EXACT time that my former recruiter walked in.
How was it that in a sea of thousands of people hustling to get to their job, he even saw me and decided to stop and talk to me?
How was it that the recruiter, (unprompted by me) decided to take the extra time to call my Director, who wasn’t even part of the department that he recruited for, to put in a good word for me?
Only God could arrange such an encounter.
In 2 Kings 8, we read of another divinely orchestrated encounter with a woman from Shunem.
This is the Shunammite woman that extended great hospitality to Elisha and hosted him in her home whenever he was passing through her town. Elisha returned her kindness by praying for God to give her a child, and soon after she gave birth to a son.
A few years later, this same son became sick and died. But Elisha prayed again and the boy was raised back to life. And later, a famine struck her country, so she moved to the land of the Philistines for 7 years to survive during that time. After the famine ended, she returned to her country to find that her home and land had been taken from her. She decided she would go before the king to see if she could get her home and land back.
It so happened that moments before she was coming to see the king, Gehazi, Elisha’s servant was telling the king about the great things that Elisha had done, and specifically about this Shunammite woman whose son Elisha had prayed for and brought back to life.
The scripture says “…At that very moment, the mother of the boy walked in to make her appeal to the king about her house and land. “Look, my Lord the king!” Gehazi exclaimed. “Here is the woman now, and this is her son—the very one Elisha brought back to life!” “Is this true?” the king asked her. And she told him the story. So he directed one of his officials to see that everything she had lost was restored to her, including the value of any crops that had been harvested during her absence.” (2 Kings 8: 5-6, NLT)
Wow! At that very moment, this woman walked in on the conversation Gehazi was having about her to the king! And as a result, she not only received back her home and land, but everything she lost was restored to her.
My friend, I want you to know that God is arranging the very same moments for you. God is not random and everything he does is perfectly timed.
There’s no coincidence or happenstance with Him. Whatever you are walking through today, I pray you will trust your life to this very God who brings things together at the exact time and place that it needs to happen.
~ Vijoy
