For Some Reason

1 Samuel 9:3 ESV

Now the donkeys of Kish, Saul’s father, were lost. So Kish said to Saul his son, “Take one of the young men with you, and arise, go and look for the donkeys.”

Most of us have shows that are amazing in our memories. We probably don’t sit down and watch them anymore but they simply live on in all their childhood glory in our sepia toned memories. One of those for me is “Quantum Leap” and as such it is reasonable click-bait for me. A quick twenty-minute documentary (it's quick because I watch it at 1.5X speed), and “oh, boy” it is all coming back to me, a scene here a scene there and my nostalgia is in full swing. The latest of these began with Scott Bakula telling of his casting. He was on a hit Broadway show at the time, and “for whatever reason” he felt the need to go back to L.A. And so, he quit and went back to California. A couple weeks later he auditioned for this part. Dean Stockwell tells a similar story about his casting in the series. Stockwell has a successful movie out and “for some reason” he is taken with this script and auditions. The rest is history or simply nostalgia for me.

“For some reason” the servant forgot that those donkeys can be pretty ornery. You have to take some extra precaution to make sure they can’t get out. The new guy got told to put them away and didn’t know, or maybe it was the donkey’s first “great escape” and no one had any idea it was coming. Yet, now they are wandering the countryside enjoying the fruits of freedom. Not being too rambunctious, so as to avoid detection, they wander the secret places of the hill country, avoiding detection. And so “For some reason” Kish sends his son to go find his donkeys instead of only his servants. “For some reason” Saul picks the servant that knows of a seer in the land of Zuph and one that is wise enough to have money in his pocket!

God’s providence is a thing that simply is not understandable by human minds. We try to connect all the dots and think we can read the tea leaves but “for some reason” it worked out differently. “For some reason” what was supposed to work didn’t and what should have been a bad idea worked. That is Providence. God working the tangled web of our lives and choices to bring about his glory and our good. The nonChristian may recognize the inability of man to control or manipulate all the variables to come to the desired conclusion and attribute such an event to being “just lucky” or to some unknown reason they can’t put a finger on. This however is far below the grateful attitude of a man seeking God’s heart. I have often wondered how a man learns so many trades that he can be an expert seamster, goldsmith, tentmaker, and bronzesmith to the point that God ordains him to build the temple (Exodus 31:3), I imagine there were many “for some reason”s that it didn’t work out for such a capable person before he got to the point that he was filled with the Holy Spirit for the Tabernacles construction.

God providentially worked in some obnoxious animals getting loose. God providentially worked in the selecting of a servant. God providentially worked in NOT finding. In all the failures you are forced to endure, as you think upon all that you are doing that doesn’t seem to be working out, do not underestimate or look past God’s providence. Keep working, keep looking, keep praising God, and let providence reign in victory and defeat. Knowing that both are for God’s glory and our good.

CRUCE, DUM SPIRO, FIDO