I’m learning that God often speaks during the most strange and unpredictable times.

This afternoon I was in downtown Vancouver attempting to hunt down a very rare movie that our group is going to analyze and present for class on Friday.  In the days prior, I had searched just about every big-name movie franchise down to the most obscure Mom ‘n’ Pop rental stores for this film, but came up empty handed.  After a quick email to my prof for some pointers, he recommended a place in the eastside of Vancouver.  So I made like a bowel and moved.

After taking my designated exit off the highway, I suddenly spotted - not 100 feet in front of me - a different video store on a busy intersection.  The sign read Tom’s Video: The Store of 100,000 Movies.   At the last second I whipped into the parking lot with the rationale of, “well HOT DANG that’s a lot of movies.  One of ‘em has got to be mine”.  I do not know why I stopped to look, but something inside of me said “just do it”.

While pulling into my parking spot, I focused on a man in a wheel chair exiting the store.  Or at least attempting to.  I noticed that he could not get through the door, even after many attempts.  He kept trying, but failed.   As I approached him, I held the door open so he could wheel himself out.  He thanked me, and without skipping a beat (as if this appointment was planned) he told me he was going across the street to McDonald's to get some dinner.  I asked if he needed help crossing the intersection, and he immediately took me up on my offer.

He was an Asian man; his middle age revealed by his receding hairline and spots of gray.  His body was frail and his right hand warped and disfigured.  When I began wheeling him along the sidewalk in our approach to the crosswalk, he began asking about me.  What school I go to.  What I am studying.  Where I am from.  What my degree is in.  Fortunately for that last one, I got to bust out my way-overused canned answer that I have spewed on just about everyone and their dog during the past year: “Business administration with a specialization in entrepreneurship.  But I am pretty sure business is not my calling in life.  I’m still figuring out what my calling is”.  He asked me what I felt my vocation was, and I answered that working in a hospital with kids is my current goal.

For the next few minutes, as if he knew I was going to say that, he advised me to follow that calling.  He urged me to seek programs for terminally ill children and places with cancer patients.  He implored me to work with the diseased and actually start-up a rehab program for the sick; programs where kids can play and learn while living with their condition.  He basically re-emphasized and confirmed once more what others have been telling me - both friends and family - but in a more radical and explicit manner.  He called the shot without even knowing me for 5 minutes.

I was perplexed and taken aback at our unorthodox conversation.  It’s not every day you help an old man in a wheel chair across a loud Vancouver intersection (helping an old lady cross the street in your boyscout uniform...maaaaybe).  Usually when one is with a stranger in Vancouver for less than five minutes, one discusses the weather; last night’s Canuck’s game; current economic fluctuations; Britney Spears’ new hairstyle (or lack of).  Light, simple topics that are used to fill socially inept moments.  Instead, he kept throwing insight towards my future as if he were the next fortune-telling Miss Cleo.

Even as I write this, I’m trying to make sense of this peculiar appointment.  Was it the unction of the Holy Spirit which prompted me to turn into this random video store?  Did God use this handicapped gentleman to speak in a timely and direct fashion to my unanswered prayer, or was this just a random coincidence?  No doubt I choose the former.  Remember that our prayers never go unanswered.  Most of the time, we're too busy to hear the voice of God.  Left with no choice, God often orchestrates some bizarre moments and uses temporary angels to shake us by our collars and speak into our situations.  What a mighty Father we serve.

I side with Albert Einstein’s words: “Coincidences are God's way of remaining anonymous”. 

Nicely put, Al.  Nicely put.  Oh, and they did have my film in stock.