He winks at me

Image result for free pictures of winking eye

Have you ever experienced Jesus’ tender loving care in your life? Have you ever been touched by his extravagant love or seen him at work in you life in a way that seems either too mundane and quaint or too intimate to be ascribed to the Lord of the universe? These are the moments when heaven intersects with earth and touches us in very meaningful ways. My atheist friends call this luck or chance. I call them heavenly winks. They are times when Jesus acts preemptively to our prayers or reacts to our prayers unexpectedly.

Here are a few personal examples of the kind of thing I mean and you will have to take my word for it!

Two summers ago I was looking to purchase a pair of white linen pants. It seemed to be the coolest type of long trousers for our Berlin summers. I set off to look for one. I trekked from store to store. This pair was way too long. This pair too tight. This one too see-through. This pair to heavy. This pair too scratchy…You get the picture. I’m not a big fan of shopping anyway, so I got tired and frustrated. I arrived home defeated and empty-handed. A few days later my landlady, an elderly woman who works as a tax consultant, placed a small bag on the steps up to our apartment. She told me it had been given to her by a former customer. I took it upstairs, opened it and in it were 2 pairs of pants. One was a pair of khakis and the other…You guessed it: a perfectly fitting pair of white linen pants. Jesus winked at me!

A few months ago my parents were visiting from the States and we decided to do a little tourism and drove out to Wannsee to visit the place where the Final Solution was decided. After our tour, we came back to vandalized car. Our license plates had been stolen, front and back. I couldn’t believe it. I was so angry. My husband drove our car to the police station near us and was told that this was a common scheme. Valid plates are stolen off a registered car, placed on a stolen car, driven over the border to Poland, and all this happens before the owner is able to report the crime, since it only takes less than an hour to get to the polish border. My dear husband fought his way through the red tape to register for new plates. A few days later, he brought our car home.

When I went out to drive it the first time, I couldn’t believe what I saw. I attributed it to my husband’s romantic streak. I had semi-personalized plates! B (for Berlin, which everyone has), EO (my nickname ever since I can remember) and a number I can easily remember, even though I’m terrible at remembering numbers, because of Biblical “numerology” (7 for perfection, 1 for unity, and 40 for fulfillment). Now that’s how my mind ticks! The next time I saw my husband I thanked him profusely for being so thoughtful and letting me have my name on the van. “I had nothing to do with it,” he said. “The plates were assigned and handed to me.” Jesus had just winked at me again!

Do you have stories like this to share? Can you see how God loves you ever so intimately, knowingly, personally? Sometimes we really wonder. God do you care? God do you not see me and my need? Moments like the ones I shared remind me that he does care, which means that the things I dislike about certain situations are also under his complete control. I’d love to hear your stories of how Jesus winks at you.

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