Memorial Box--Searching

Things have been extremely busy around here, and I didn't think I'd have time for a Memorial Box post. But, I'm glad I found the time AND I can't wait to share this story with my girls tonight during our prayer time. (For more about what a Memorial Box is, click the photo above.)

I've told you before...I married my high school sweetheart.

We married young, and our wedding set was quite modest. The sentimental value though was priceless.

When we had been married less than 10 years, I looked down one day to find that the setting on the engagement ring was gone.

GONE........

All that was on my finger was the gold band. This ring was made differently than most, and it appeared that the small 1/4 carat diamond cluster was simply "welded" on. How could I possibly NOT have felt the force that would have broken it off?

It was a Wednesday night. I had worked all day, been to the dentist, and then to prayer meeting. The setting could have been anywhere.

The next day, my teaching assistant helped me comb the classroom. I went through files in my filing cabinet, we slept the floor, and she even dug through the garbage can. I called the dentist office, and the staff there looked. I went to the church and traced every step. After days of searching, I'd like to say I found the setting, but I didn't.

Stan and I looked into replacing the setting. We also looked a new rings.

With Christmas approaching and our tenth anniversary just a few months away, I decided I would like an anniversary ring instead. We shopped and found a nice ring on sale, and my sweet honey made sure he placed it on a branch of the Christmas tree that Christmas Eve.


Fast forward a few years.

I got up one morning and couldn't find my anniversary ring. I looked in the jewerly box and on the night stand. (I sometimes took the ring off at night because my hands will swell.) Not finding it, I went on to work.

When I came home from work, I began to search for the ring again.

Once again, I looked in my bedroom where I really thought it was...and couldn't find it. I took the things off my nightstand, placed them on the bed, and then moved the nightstand. Still no ring. Then, I placed the things back on my nightstand.

I decided I would "dig" through my purse. Maybe it had slipped off my finger at some time. As I looked through my purse, I felt God speaking. I thought about all of the lost people I knew, and how little I was doing to "search" for them. There was much in my purse that was just in the way, including a golf ball. I felt God telling me, "There is nothing wrong with a golf ball, but even good things get in the way of the work I have for you." Without finding the ring, I felt God was trying to teach me to search for the lost the same way I had searched for the ring.

I decided I needed to stop looking for the ring and begin looking in God's word.

I went to the bedroom.

I reached for my Bible on the night stand....

The same night stand I had earlier removed everything from.

There, on my Bible, was my ring.

You can imagine my surprise. Perhaps it's the same surprise you feel now.

I don't know where the ring had been earlier. I had moved THAT Bible just minutes earlier, had placed it on the bed, AND had moved the Bible back to the night stand. There is NO way I could have missed that ring.

I told some friends that an angel had it in his pocket. He kept it there until I slowed down enough to listen to the Spirit.

Maybe....

But, I do know that my heart was fertile ground for God's voice that night.

So, in our Memorial Box, I am placing a ring.....not THE ring, but a simple ring, to remind us that God wants to talk to us!