Answering Prayer

Today I had the crazy opportunity to push a stranger across the street. I was crossing the road toward our apartment when I saw a large black woman with her foot swollen and wrapped, struggling to move the wheelchair she sat in. The rubber had come off both front wheels, and the hard plastic rims had no grip on the pavement, so she was pushing and pushing her wheels but making hardly any progress.

The crosswalk was already counting down, so I didn't have time to feel awkward, and I asked if she needed a push.

"Yes I do! I was so scared, and I prayed, and he must have heard me. Thank you."

So I pushed her across the street, and she directed me to turn her around and pull her backwards up the little curb back onto the sidewalk and then push her up to the bus stop, and she was very patient all the times I fumbled and her broken wheels got stuck. She said she'd be fine to get on the bus, that the driver would help her, and that she was going to the hospital up the street, and she would make it.

I was struck by the opportunity to do something useful, and I was struck by what a gift community is and how vulnerable we are without it, that this woman was almost stranded in the middle of the street because she has no one to fix the wheels on her wheelchair.

Ephesians 2:10 says,

For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.

I am thankful for this reminder that it is all grace, that even the good things we do are not independent of God providing the opportunity.