"Such knowledge is too wonderful for me, too lofty for me to attain" (Psalm 139:6, NIV 2011).

I received a text from Janice today. "They did not have approval for my medicine."

Janice requires long-term immune globulin for an immunodeficiency and my office had forgotten to update her insurance approval. I apologized for the mistake and her wasted time.

The next day, she texted, "You won't believe what happened because I missed my treatment." It took me a couple of days to call her back and hear her story.

"I told my husband when I left clinic that God must have other plans for me. Little did I know. Normally, I meet with two friends for prayer on Wednesday afternoons but have to skip on the day I get my immune globulin. So, this week when I was turned away from your office, I decided to call my friend and meet her as usual. I got to Panera and could not find her, so I sat outside and waited. A young man came up, looking street weary, and asked if I could help buy him some food. I took him inside and bought him lunch, then asked him to sit with me. He shared his story of losing his job and living at the mission. He was about my son's age. He told me his parents lived in another city. Eventually, my friend arrived and joined our conversation. After a few minutes, my friend blurted out, 'I know who you are. Your parents are in my Sunday school.' I then also realized then who he was. I said to him, 'I have been praying for you for two years. I have held your mother as she cried for you.' We talked of Christ, of his turning from faith. Tears came often to his eyes. He did not return to Christ while we were with him but I left him with these words, 'You know that our meeting today was not by accident. Jesus wants you back again. You need to let Him in.'"

Janice finished her story and ended by saying, "I never would have been there for him if your office had not messed up my treatment. God knows what He is doing."

We think we know.

We walk through life, sorting things out in our heads, not only planning our own days, but also planning how God should do things.

We are convinced that the important things in our lives will never work out unless we take hold of them ourselves and control the outcomes; or, if we have a little faith, we believe things will work out if God does what we ask Him to do.

And then God steps in and, because a nurse forgets to file an insurance approval, a lost boy is offered a way home.

"Such knowledge is too wonderful for me, too lofty for me to obtain." As Watchman Nee put it in The Normal Christian Life: "It is not a case of trying but of trusting; not of struggling but of resting in him."

God knows. God cares. God can.

Dear Father,
Let me seek to control less and to follow your lead more.
Amen