The Hand of God. . .

Today I met a couple of men in a garage at a men's halfway house in Butler, Indiana.  My friend wanted to introduce me to the manager of the facility.   They were sitting in the garage, talking on folding chairs, I know not about what. But surrounded by tools, and parts, and a car with a disassembled front end, upon learning that I was a chaplain mentoring one of their newly arrived residents, they said that if a vehicle of mine ever needed repair that they would be glad to do it for me.

It took me back. . .probably 20 years ago, to a similar happening.  I was ministering to a fellow who had recently been released from jail, and needed a vehicle to get back and forth to work.  I had an old Chevy S10 pickup truck that I was going to let him use, but it had a failing fuel pump.

Maple City chapel church in Goshen, Indiana was located in a former Kmart I believe.  It had several car service bays where tire changes were done in its former life, where on Wednesday evenings the men of the church performed small automotive repairs for the church members as fellowship.

The fellow recently out of jail, and I took my truck over there one Wednesday evening.  I had ordered the fuel pump motor only, not the entire assembly.  The motor was about 50 bucks, the whole assembly was over 400 dollars.  I am no car mechanic.  I can do very simple things, but replacing the fuel pump was beyond me.

I was amazed at how easily the bed of the truck came off.  Four bolts were all that held the bed to the frame of the truck.  We had it off in a very few minutes, revealing the gas tank, and the opening where the fuel pump resided in the top of the tank.

Again in just a few minutes we removed the fuel pump assembly, and had replaced the failing motor, with the new motor I had ordered on Amazon.  When we tried to reassemble the pump into the tank, there was a tapered fit between the two.  We fought and fought, but it wouldn't go in.

There was one professional mechanic in the group of men there.  He came by, saw our difficulty, and asked us if we had spilled any gasoline on the large o-ring seal that went around the pump assembly. . .  "Yes" we replied, when we removed the pump assembly, gasoline dripped on the seal.  He told us that the seal was ruined.  When the gasoline got on it, it caused the seal to swell, thereby making it impossible to reinstall.

It was early in the evening, and there was a car parts store just a few blocks from the church, so my friend and I headed over there with the ruined seal in hand.  There was only one clerk in the store, and several people were ahead of us at the two or three computer terminals that the clerk was scrambling to attend to.

We waited at the register, right by the front door for quite a while, maybe about half an hour, before he got to us.  I showed the clerk the seal and told him the situation.  He looked up the part on his computer, and told us that that seal could only be purchased as part of the fuel pump assembly, and not as an individual component.

At that exact moment as those words came out of his mouth, a man walked through the front door, looked at the seal in my hand and said, "That's a fuel pump seal for a Chevy S10 pickup truck", I have one of those in my toolbox at home that you can have.

My friend and I were in shock. . .like we were in a dream, we kind of numbly followed the man out the door, and went to his garage, which was on the way back to the church, where he went immediately to his toolbox, opened a drawer, and handed us the exact match to the seal that we needed. . . We thanked him profusely, in less than a minute we were on our way.

We went back to the Maple City chapel service bays, told all the men gathered there what happened, and the dozen or so men gathered there on hearing our testimony of the events at the car parts store.  We all began dancing in the aisles and exuberantly worshipping God in the service bays. 

There is NO other explanation than the hand of God.  The timing was soooooooo perfect.  Mere seconds earlier or later, and the man with the seal would have missed our interaction with the clerk.  What are the chances of someone walking through the door at that exact time, who recognized what was going on, and also had the exact seal that we needed.  All the things that had to come together the clerk, us, the man with the seal. . . with stunningly precise timing.  No doubt at all, it was God all the way.

On my relating this testimony, again today the four of us rejoiced in a garage in Butler, Indiana, we celebrated how God watches over and provides for His children. . . 

Above is a picture I found online of a truck that looks similar to the one I had.

Again and again and again. . . coincidence?  Good luck?  NO, it is the hand of God!

I love You my God. . . 

Thank You for watching over us. . . 

<3

Dave