The Eraser by Susan L.

   For some reason this memory keeps popping into my head. I've blogged about it before but seeing as Thanksgiving is coming up, it's a great little gratitude testimony of God's limitless generosity.
  It was the second time I was hospitalized where I spent copious amounts of time drawing to help me get through the ponderous hours of a psych ward. I asked the staff for an eraser several days in a row but one wasn't forthcoming so eventually I gave up asking.
  It was over Christmas in 2008 and one of the kinder nurses bought the pop open Christmas crackers for everyone still there sharing their turkey supper. There was an eraser in mine in the shape of Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer. I'll never forget the nurse's face when he saw what bounced across the table. Even I was stunned not believing what I was seeing!
  Maybe it's because we are studying Revelations and this small miracle speaks to me of the infinite authority of God. I start following the rabbit trail from the moment the eraser came into my hands. Every time my imagination travels the trail, I am completely awestruck by everything that was put in place to make sure I got my heart's desire. It was such a little thing, too.
   The nurse bought the crackers out of his own pocket. He chose the right box which had been shipped to the right store. The manufacturer assembled the prizes and crackers because someone had invented them a couple hundred years ago. I am not sure where Rudolph came from but he is definitely part of someone's inspired imagination.
  Somebody designed the eraser which was made of nylon. There's a whole slew of invention going right back to the discovery that rubbing two sticks together makes fire.
  Then there's the human factor. Every single person involved was born to become part of this incredibly complicated tapestry of life: from the nurse who handed me my cracker to the designers and inventors of everything from paper to gunpowder to electricity. Their lives predestined them to become part of mine at a time when I really needed to know I was loved.
  I had chosen to remain in hospital over that Christmas. It must have been tough on my family. I felt bad about it but had no reserves left to face the organized chaos of a family dinner. But then, God knew exactly where I would be long before my feet trod the earth.
  "Let a man so consider us, as servants of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God." 1 Cor 4:1