Synchronicity or Providence

I'm thankful for the surprises God brings into my days.

As I was walking up to a patient's door this week, a man was just getting settled into a steno chair by the door. I asked if he was with the patient I was to see, and he told me he was with someone in another room, and just finding a place to wait while the medical folks were performing a procedure.

It turned out that the person I went to see wasn't in the room, so on the way out I began to exchange pleasantries with the man. That spark of interest gave him permission to tell me some of his story, about a relative to whom the doctors had just said they had no further help to offer. He talked to me about God's help, and we talked about how hard this circumstance was. And at the end of the visit, I asked if he'd like to pray, and he said, "Absolutely." I can still feel his strong grip on my hand as we prayed.

Just when this man needed someone to be able to open his heart to and share the pain he was feeling, God brought me to him and made me available by having the person I went to see be out of the room. I can't believe that was "synchronicity," the word the world uses to describe such happenings. It could only be providence, the work of the Holy God.