Being useful

It's funny, how God gives different callings to different saints for different kinds of ministries.

My mom has been in the nursing field since she was 18, and now she is 58. Her nursing skills always come in handy for situatons that come about outside the hospital. Just a couple of days ago she was talking to me on the phone, recounting an event in the recent past where there was a car accident and she got out of her car to help someone, and right in the middle of telling me this story, she said, "Oh, no. Something's happened here, there's an accident, and that woman is going to need help. I'll let you go." She told me later that a woman had whiplash, and my mom told her to not move her neck, and she was too stressed to listen, so my mom told her that she was going to help hold her head still, and she did, till the paramedics arrived.

She said to me, "Don't you ever get involved like that, Michele (that's my name), because if you're not certified, you can get into all kinds of trouble. The paramedics asked me, 'Are you a nurse?' and I said, 'Yes I am,' and they said, 'Alright, we'll take it from here.'"

I thought to myself afterwards, well, I've never been put in that kind of situation, when my mom has, over and over. How incredible can it be, that she is telling me her story of helping with a car accident and then getting interrupted to do the same kind of service!!

Then later that day I went to pick up Grace from preschool. I had driven by an unkempt man on my way. Lo, and behold, there he appeared a couple minutes later, I found out, a homeless man who was lost and hungry. I had just bought a huge sandwich at safeway as a back-up for Liz's fussiness, debating whether or not I should have wasted my money, but now I knew the real reason why I purchased it. The man was trying to get help from the woman in the office of the church, and she wasn't helping him very much, so I took over, and drew him a map and talked to him for as long as he was interested.

It just happens to be that I happen to be at the right place at the right time when it comes to women who are experiencing issues with pregnancy, too, beyond what I think would be normal.

Can that be coincidence? Well, I knew that pregnant-women were a population God has used me for, but I am only now starting to get the idea that the homeless are another group God is preparing me and pointing me to. There have been a couple of other times when similar things have happened recently. I noticed this morning especially how there were more homeless-looking types, across the street from the church, some even digging through the garbage cans. Hmm. Well, the reason why I am here in the middle of Salem instead of close to home is because my church's preschool was full, and I had to find another. Now I know why God allowed me to find this preschool. After all, all I've heard from everyone is "Why go all the way over there?" and I didn't have an answer for them, kinda felt like I was impulsive in my selection.

It just struck me, too, that those were the needs I had, when I was growing up. I lived out of my car, went to the churches, looking for help with a place to stay.

God has made me useful, and I get jealous when I hear the stories of what my mom has been able to do. I wanted to be a nurse, so bad. I still do. I want to have the so incredibly useful knowledge of how to care for physical concerns. But God has closed that door, by the principles the bible have taught me are His will for my life.

But seeing how God has made me useful for other kinds of needs, I am at peace with His choices for my life.