In the movie “Forrest Gump” there is a scene where Lt. Dan is on the top of a ship’s mast in a raging storm shouting at God in anger. He is doing this because of his frustration with a life situation that caused him physical and emotional pain. In this scene, he challenges God to “Come on! Show me what you’ve got!” or something to that effect though I do not remember the exact line.  And just after this is said, something happened to which Forrest Gump, who had been witnessing this verbal outburst observed, “And just then, God showed up.”

Well, Friday afternoon in an unexpected way and time, God showed up at our home to reaffirm to me and Anna that He will indeed show up when we may least expect it and in the most unusual ways.

While Anna and I were in the living room on Friday afternoon, looking at some family pictures and trying to select the ones we would use in the services for Mike on Saturday, she began to play some old video tapes she had found from years earlier when she and Abby were about 7 years old. Then she found other tapes from years in the past in which Ashely, the twins, many friends and family members, Mike, and I were shown in a variety of family activities. While viewing these we laughed a lot, shared a tear or two and reminisced about the good times shown on these tapes.

On one of the tapes, there was a segment from when Anna was elected as the state Jr. Beta Club secretary for Florida. When she was serving in this office, she was sent to a leadership training conference in Charlotte, NC for a week. While at this training, she met and became fast friends with a young lady from Mississippi named Caitlin Churchwell. At the end of the week they actually cried when they had to leave each other and promised to stay in touch. But unlike most of these types of quick meetings, they in fact did remain in contact with each other. They talked on the phone, sent emails and messages and before long, they were talking about visiting with one another.

Over the next 5 or 6 years, they remained in contact, became very good friends and visited each other often. Mike and I attended Caitlin’s graduation from high school and her parents came to Anna’s graduation. As I said, they were really close friends.

But alas, as often happens in life, they had a little squabble or disagreement, had some hurt feelings and basically lost touch with one another for several years.  I am not sure of all of the reasons behind this but suffice it to say that both probably had some responsibility in the matter.

Anyway, as we were looking at the photos and videos on Friday, when the one came up with the Jr. Beta Club events on it, I casually asked Anna if she had heard from Caitlin lately. She responded that she had not heard from her but thought Abby had received some contact from her via Facebook at some time in the past couple of years. She had not talked to her, seen her, nor had any type of contact at all since the misunderstanding years earlier.

After a few more minutes of looking at phots and videos, Anna got up, went to her room and put on her swimsuit to join the other family members and kids that were out in the pool swimming.

About 30 minutes or maybe as much as 45 minutes later, Prissy the dog and resident warning signal for our home, ran to the back door barking. I looked out the door and saw Caitlin Churchwell and her mom walking toward the pool out from under the car port.

When Anna spotted Caitlin, she immediately came up out of the pool crying and ran to her and they embraced, holding onto each other. It was a moment of pure shock, astonishment, surprise or any other word one could use to describe an amazing, unexplained, maybe unexplainable manifestation of God showing up when we least expected it.

After the initial interaction with one another, they came inside and visited with us for a while, catching up with one another. They talked about a lot of stuff but mostly just enjoyed one another’s company for a while and hearing about their families and jobs with both of them being married now with children and both of them working in education. When it was time for them to leave and continue on their journey home, once again the tears flowed and the hugs were long and tight.

With the passing away of my wife on Tuesday, June 19, 2018, the last week has indeed been one of the darkest hours or times of my life and in the lives of our children.  But this incident of God sending someone back to us in our time of need serves to remind us all of His great love for us.

In witnessing this event, my heart was filled with the spirit of God as He once again reminded me of His ever present love for us and revealed His grace to us in a totally unexpected way. This was in fact a beautiful reminder to me and Anna that God will never leave us nor forsake us even in our darkest moments of life.