Divine Coincidence

Since I arrived here in Masealama, unexplainable coincidences keep occurring. We all experience these at some point in our lives- whether it be meeting someone from your hometown in a foreign country or finding $20 in your pocket when you are running low on cash. Recently, I have been experiencing them in an unusual rapid succession.

A week after I arrived, I was greeted by a young man named Gift who said “Come with me.” After glancing at the ladies I work with for approval to follow this stranger, I got up and followed him. He led me up the hill to one of the old German mission buildings that had fallen into disrepair where I found a van full of volunteers from a nearby town hard at work cleaning this building and setting up for the festivities of the afternoon. As Gift took me around and introduced me to the volunteers from various places all over the world who were setting up this youth centre here in Masealama, I saw a guitar out of the corner of my eye. This centre is being established to teach music, arts, sports, and more to the children of this town to keep them off of the streets and learning life skills which can be applied to their schooling and all aspects of their lives. As it turns out, they had six guitars donated, but no one knew how to play so they couldn’t teach the children. This past year I started learning the guitar, and I happened to bring all of my music with me so I could teach the people here some songs, but I decided not to bring the guitar here to South Africa. Turns out I didn’t need to! They desperately needed someone who could play the guitar, and I desperately wanted a guitar to play.

This occurrence was the beginning of my parade of the strange and unexplainable. My “Feeding Chickens Chicken” blog was posted as a movie came out featuring chicken cannibalism, my last newsletter was released at the same time as one of Pastor Chris Heavner’s morning devotions which focused on making a blessing out of a curse, and my daily bible readings have frequently matched my reflections on my experience here to a pin. So why are these coincidences rapidly occurring? Can they be explained by the influx of ghosts, goblins, and haunted houses as they prepare for All Hallows Eve? Are they simply coincidences that I am becoming aware of because of my increased state of observation? Or are they divine- small “gifts” from God to help guide me along my journey here in South Africa?
It is easy to label these occurrences as mere coincidences or supernatural, but I now see them as trail markers of God’s presence in our lives. They are subtle reminders of his awesome power and ability to provide for us in ways we cannot fathom. While we wander though the woods to make our own decisions on which paths to take, his trail markers remind us that we are not guiding, we are being guided. There is no such thing as coincidence; it is just a sign of the presence of the divine within us- guiding our ways.

~Heather Anne Nelson