Thank You for interruptions!

      Thank You, Father, for interruptions.
      ...and forgive me for my impatience that so often causes me to forfeit the joy of seeing Your sovereign hand behind every one of those interruptions.  Your thumbprints are all over every one of our interruptions, and I want to be carried along by the sovereign tide of Your plans and ways, rather than fighting and striving against the flow of Your grace.  Help me to say "Yes, Lord!" to every interruption and to see in each an opportunity, rather than an obstacle.  A surprising divine opportunity to spread about Your relentless love and hope in ways I hadn't anticipated.
       How about it?  Will you join me this weekend in choosing to be thankful for interruptions?                  Think about it: God is sovereign over all things, all people, all plans, all places.  As Abraham Kuyper once declared, "There is not a square inch in the whole domain of our human existence over which Christ, who is Sovereign over all, does not cry, Mine!"  If the Lord is completely, totally, ultimately Sovereign over all, then every single "interruption"that comes our way must indeed, be redefined as "God's appointments."  As God's opportunities, rather than man's obstacles.
      I started to write about this three days ago...and then interruption after interruption...no, correction: appointment after appointment came my way.  Three broken down cars in one day.  Several items that I needed to get to our daughter in Chapel Hill asap.  Lots of sudden new responsibilities on a school committee--things that I had to get done now, not later.  Not to mention a birthday for one of our children; another child coming into town with errands I needed to run...and the list goes on and on.  Nothing earth-shattering, mind you, but just lots and lots of things that had to be done that necessitated pushing aside my busy agenda and to-do list in favor of other priorities.
      But God has so imprinted on my heart that these are HIS appointments, HIS priorities, and HIS people that I'm to be busy serving and loving.  Here's how C.S. Lewis puts it: "The great thing, if one can, is to stop regarding all the unpleasant things as interruptions of one's 'own,' or 'real' life.  The truth is of course that what one calls the interruptions are precisely one's real life--the life God is sending one day by day."
      More another day on the catalyst for this correction and realignment of my perspective, but for now, it's simply thank You, Father, for reminding me to be thankful for interruptions--Your sovereign appointments--in my life.
      "The steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord, and He delights in his way.  Though he fall, he shall not be utterly cast down; for the Lord upholds him with His hand." (Ps.37:23-24)  Thank You, Abba, that You order our every step, You delight in our way, and You will use even our missteps and falls for our ultimate good and Your greater glory.
      Thank You for every opportunity You give us to teach us, to grow us, to conform us into Your image, and to use us as dispensers of Your glorious grace.   Whatever interruptions come our way this day, we ask that You would immediately realign our thinking to see each and every one as Your divine intervention in our lives.  Might we be overflowing with gratitude for the privilege of being used by You in unexpected or unusual ways this day and every day.  Thank You for the gift of helping us to die to ourselves and our selfishness, and thank You for the joy of serving and loving others.  
      To God be the glory.