It was Mother’s Day and our family had attended church together that morning and then gone out to eat together for lunch. My husband had selected a place near the beach and the weather was beautiful. We sat at a nice round table outside and everyone was enjoying the sound of the waves and the ocean breezes.
Then, as I reached to touch my husband’s hand and thank him for the meal, he noticed that the bracelet that I had on earlier in the day was missing from my wrist. He asked where it was and I replied that I didn’t know, perhaps it had fallen off somewhere. I realized that I had just been to the ladies’ room inside the restaurant and perhaps the clasp had come lose as I had washed and dried my hands with the paper hand towels.
I eased from the table and went to search the restroom, and retrace my steps, but did not discover it. However, while I was there alone, my heart reached out to the Lord God, and I said, “Lord, you know where the bracelet is, because I know that you know all things. Perhaps, Lord, if you would desire for us to find it, we would be ever grateful, and we would give you all the praise for it. But, if there is a reason that we are not aware of, that you would not want for us to recover it, I know that you know what would be best. None-the-less, Lord, I desire that we would find it, since it was a gift that my husband gave me on our 10thwedding anniversary, which I know that you are fully aware of. Still, if you do not want to reveal to us its location, I praise you because you are all-knowing. That is who you are. And I praise your name, because you are an all-knowing God! Thank you, Lord!”
Shortly after, I searched the trash, walked through the restaurant on a hunt, searched the path to the table, looked under the table, that another party had been newly seated at, and asked the managers to see if their staff could search the trash that had been recently bagged up. Why? Because the bracelet was valuable to me! It was a very expensive gold and diamond tennis bracelet, worth a lot of money, and held great sentimental value symbolic of our then 27-year marriage covenant!
We left the restaurant, but hope still remained. The restaurant was to call me once the trash search had been done in their maintenance facilities later in the day. But something miraculous was about to happen. As we drove on the interstate toward our home, after spending sometime at the beach, my husband turned the vehicle onto an exit in the direction of the church we had attended that morning. I wasn’t sure where he was going at first and then it occurred to me. As I continued to seek and trust in God’s will in the situation, quietly as we approached the church, my husband pulled up to the sidewalk in front of the church building. He remembered that we had taken family pictures there earlier in the day with all our children present, to celebrate mother’s day. He remembered that I was wearing the special anniversary bracelet in the picture in honor of his giving it to me some 17 years earlier. Without a word, he shinned the headlights onto the sidewalk, since by then it was night, and there upon the cement, lo and behold, I saw something shimmer! I got out of the car and moved toward it, knowing that it could materialize at any minute, and that’s exactly what happened! Before, my very eyes, under the night sky, in the small beam of headlights, on the large cement walkway, was a tiny little lump of gold links and small-cut diamonds that was my very own bracelet! It was so small in such a vast space! But it was seen by God, in His great universe where He sees, and knows all things! I reached and picked up the bracelet! It was a majestic, unbelievable, and jaw-dropping moment, where all of time stood still, and my soul within me rejoiced in our all-knowing God! Never say never! Anything is possible with our God! Not only is He all-knowing, but He is all-powerful and all-presence in this great world that He has created! And all things truly are possible with God!
Article Written by: Debbie Harper, Ph.D.
