“The List”

I don’t know if you are like me, but I need to make lists. To-do lists, grocery lists, priority lists, etc. This happens to be about a grocery list written years ago. I was needing groceries and I lived on a very tight budget. Every penny had to be accounted for. My son’s were young and I worked a fulltime job, which was good but always seemed to be “too much” to get help and “too little” to make it. I had to make a grocery run to buy what I needed for the week. I took my list to the store and began buying my groceries. I happen to go down an isle to pick up something I needed when I came across the rice.

I love rice, especially with cinnamon and sugar.  It was not on my list, but how I wanted the rice.  I picked it up and held it in my hand for the longest time.  I wanted it, silly as it may sound, rice is still relatively inexpensive, but it was not on the list, and if I bought the rice, something on my list would have to go.  That was not an option.  I set the rice back down, very hesistantly, and finished buying the things on my “list”.

Later that evening after I had prepared dinner for my two young son’s I heard a knock on my door.  I answered it and there stood this little old lady.  She was short and thin and probably in her late 70’s.  She had in her hands a bag of rice and a jar of peanut butter.  She told me that she had these things and that she never ate them and wanted to know if I wanted them.  I questioned her about who she was, I had never seen her before, and this was a SMALL town, I knew everyone.  I worked at the City Offices in the Electric department and took payments for electric bills.  I had “seen” almost everyone in that town.  She told me she was a neighbor and she just thought I might like the rice and peanut butter.  I took the rice and peanut butter, thanked her for her kindness, and I never saw her again.

Was she really a neighbor, or was she an “angel in disguise”?  I will not know this side of Heaven, what I do know is that the Lord is good and cares for us, even the petty desires of our hearts.  Mmmmm, as Psalm 34:8 says: “Taste and see that the Lord is good”…….