Answered Prayers.

I do not believe in coincidences. 

I believe God is in control and that He knew all of our days before we had even lived one.  That became very evident for me this past week.  God heard my prayers and my heart break and he answered me with a two things that had been set in motion years earlier.  If that sounds strange, I will explain.  Stay with me, this will make sense eventually.

A few years ago, when I was still "Single City Katie" living in downtown Chicago, I was invited to a jewelry party thrown by a dear friend of mine and the stylist was another good friend.  My first thought was "Oh man, I am going to have to buy something whether I like this stuff or not.  I'll feel bad or cheap if I don't.  Ugh.".

Well I went to the party and it was far from annoying.  I had a great time and I loved the jewelry and I bought this super cute chunky gold chain necklace and bracelet combo.  Over the next year or so I kept buying more of this jewelry from my friend's website and I amassed quite a collection.  All the while, my stylist friend kept talking to me about becoming a stylist myself.  I declined.  I was managing a team of 7 sales people, traveling all over the US for work, volunteering and attempting to look for Mr. Right.  I did not have time to be throwing in home Trunk Shows on top of that.  But I kept on shopping with her. 

Fast forward to 2011.  I moved to Maine where I had no friends or social life, changed jobs to a less demanding work from home position, and I was looking for a way to make friends and supplement our income....all of a sudden becoming a stylist sounded like a pretty good idea.  Josh and I prayed about it together for a while.  We went to an informational session in Boston (where Josh was one man in a room of about 200 women, haha).  We talked it over and I took the plunge, signed up and a week later we found out we were pregnant with Jack.  I had terrible morning sickness for the first 22 weeks.  I threw my first trunk show.  I mailed invites to 80 people and 6 came.  I started reconsidering our decision.

During that time, I had started a weekly Bible Study/Book Club with some other women in the neighborhood.  We were reading and discussing "The Power of a Praying Wife".  One of the other women said she wanted to host a Trunk Show in March, I was encouraged! 

The March show fell through.  We pushed it to April.  I was put on bed rest.  We cancelled again. Jack came in May.  We rescheduled for August.  August got busy, we pushed it to September.  September we were in the hospital all month, we put the show on hold again. October would be better.  October was worse, Jack went home to heaven. Maybe November?  No.  December 5th.  That would be the day.  And it was.

That morning I was talking to the wonderful postpartum nurse practitioner from my OB office.  I was telling her how hard it was to look back on Jack's short life and not know if he knew how loved he was.  To not know if he was happy here with us before things got really bad.  I had promised him so many times in the hospital that he had to go through these hard things before we could take him home.  I promised him he would get better and we would go home and do all sorts of fun things as a family.  I promised him all the tests and pokes and IVs and surgeries would make him all better.  And he didn't get better.  I feel like I lied to him.  I really hope he doesn't see me as a liar.  I just wish I knew that he knows how much he was loved and treasured.

Later that day, I went over to my friend's house to set up for the trunk show.  As I was pulling trays out of my bag, her four year old son, JH, was eating his dinner at the kitchen island.  All of a sudden he looked up and said "Mommy, I have to draw her something." (and he pointed to me across the room.)  I didn't think much of that but my friend told me how JH doesn't like to give his drawings to anyone.  They try to get him to draw something for his visiting grandparents and he says no.  He likes to keep every dinosaur, robot and pirate ship for himself.  Well, he sits down over his paper and goes to work.  I turned back to my table and when he was finished, JH presented me with this:

When his Mom asked him what it was, he explained that it was a cloud, a flower and a heart.  She has never seen him draw any of these things before.  She asked if he drew the cloud because of a cloud they had seen earlier that day.  He shook his head.  "No, I drew this for her because I LOVE her." And he hopped off his stool and walked over to me, handed me the picture and hugged me.

Not normal 4 year old boy behavior.  Not a coincidence.

JH's mom and I both agreed that that drawing is a gift from another little boy.  A baby boy who loved to be outside, who was happy outside.  A baby boy who knows he is loved. 

JH's mom cried.  I felt peace.  God had heard my cry and had sent me this drawing to assure my heart.  And he had orchestrated this meeting on this night with events that started years earlier.  He knows all of my days before I live them.  He knows what I will need and when.  And He loves me enough to send me encouragement precisely when I need it.  This drawing was a gift from my Lord, delivered on the exact day it was intended. 

So that is why we weren't able to get the show together in the 9 months before now.  It wasn't time.

Now that original gold chain played another role last week.  It has since been retired from the collection.  There is a Facebook group for stylists to exchange retired pieces. I just found out about it a few weeks ago.  One night I couldn't sleep.  I was laying in bed looking at Facebook on my iPhone and I saw that a woman was looking for that specific gold chain.  Five other stylists had already commented and offered theirs and I don't know why I even bothered but I offered mine, as well.  The next morning I awoke to an email from this woman in Texas.  She looked at my profile and saw I was in Maine, she was coming to Maine a few days later for Christmas Prelude.  Strange.  She wanted to connect with me over the other five women because she said she felt God leading her.  We began to exchange a series of emails and we discovered many other things in common.  Including, her friend who would be coming to Maine with her and had lost an infant grandchild years ago. 

We decided to meet up for coffee.  We had a wonderful time and the three of us discovered many things we had in common and ways we could encourage each other through difficulties we are facing.  Through it all, we share a strong faith in Christ.  I felt really encouraged by their testimonies. There is no way that was a coincidence.  No way.  This woman told me she didn't even know why she wanted that chain anymore.  She had signed up to be a stylist after attending a fundraiser for family who had a critically ill infant.  She did it to support the mother, who had become a stylist to help offset medical bills of hospitalization, g-tubes and many surgeries.  Yes, really.  Now she felt she had done her part to help and was selling off all of her samples.  She was leaving the business.  Why did she want to buy another piece of jewelry?  She didn't know.  And that whole meet up was set in motion years ago when I was a single city girl who bought a necklace at a home trunk show.

God is at work in my life right now.  These two events served to encourage me and help me see that God already knows how He will use things that are happening now.  And while I wait to see how all of that will play out, I have this drawing on my refrigerator reminding me that Jack did know he was loved and he still knows it today as he plays in heaven under the watchful eye of the same God who is watching over me.