Believing Prayer

     It happened in the city of Portland.  I had been praying that some music plates made in Chicago would arrive in time to get the songs printed to take with me on a trip Monday morning.  It came up to Sunday, the day before, and they had not arrived, though I did have word that they had been sent by express.  But did you ever try to get something out of an express office on Sunday?

     All morning I kept calling the main office and the branch office without results.  About one or two o’clock the branch office closed for the day, and the main office expected nothing more in from Chicago.  I think I was surprised more than disappointed, for I had really expected my prayer to be answered.  But nothing more could be done; so Judy and I took an interurban that ran between Portland and Gladstone, where the Oregon camp meeting was in session. 

     Just after a stop along the way, a girl came and sat down beside me.  She had been dozing, she said, and then roused by the stop, she looked around and saw me.  I knew her only as Mary.  She had frequently come to the office of “The Quiet Hour” program and helped with mailing as a volunteer.  I knew nothing else about her.  But she said, “There’s a package for you down at the office.”

     I had the strange feeling that someone had been looking over my shoulder all morning.  “What office”? I asked.  And she said, “The express office.  It came in about eleven o’clock.”

     Judy and I got off at the next stop, went back into Portland, got the plates, and took them to the printer, who printed the songs that night.  I took them with me the next morning, with the ink still not completely dry.

     The remarkable thing about all this is that Mary was the only person in the world who both knew me and knew where that package was.  And God put us on the same interurban!

     And again I treasure this sort of experience because it shows that God is interested in everything that concerns us, whether or not it involves great danger or any threat to life.  He is concerned with the little things, too.

     ….There is hardly a day that I don’t feel the presence of those faithful celestial beings—or see some undeniable evidence that they have been around….

M. L. Lloyd