Given names like Ronald and Donald, you would know about how old we are. Kids are rarely given those names today. Ron and I grew up in the Boston area but we didn’t know each other as kids as far as we know. But once a Boston fan, always a Boston fan rooting for the Red Sox, Patriots, Celtics and the Bruins. When tragedy happens in Boston, we would shout out, “Boston Strong!”
Ron and I ended up working for American Baptist Educational Ministries in Valley Forge. He edited a few articles I was a part of in the ABC magazine and I invited him to serve on national youth conferences. When we lived in the Valley Forge area, our families were members of the same Baptist church. Ron was one of our son’s groomsmen and when our daughter was still living in Pennsylvania after we moved to San Francisco, Ron and his wife became substitute parents for her.
Ron and I saw each other occasionally down through the years mostly when the Red Sox were playing the Oakland A’s. But recently, we have had surprisingly unexpected encounters. A couple of years ago, we looked up in front of a mirror in an airline lounge men’s room in Boston Logan Airport and saw each other. Ron was going home to Philadelphia and I to SF. Last year when I was in the elevator of a Pasadena Hilton, the door opened on a floor and Ron walked in! We made sure to find a time for breakfast to share how incredible it is to see each other totally unexpected and unplanned! What are the chances for this!
It’s been said that when you don’t believe in coincidences, miracles don’t happen. Is the world truly that small that we may be in the same place with friends and not know it? Is God’s presence so much with us that when we just open our eyes a little more, we have amazing encounters more often than we think? When the bleeding woman in the crowd reached out to touch Jesus’ cloak because she really wanted to be healed, Jesus was there to make it happen. Was it by chance or was it all a part of God’s plan? For the woman, it was a miraculous encounter.
This Thanksgiving holiday weekend, we spent the weekend up in the Sonoma coast and guess who we encountered? Our daughter saw Ron at the lodge and Ron surprised me by knocking on the front door of the house we were staying. Is it coincidence or a miracle that Ron and I seem to encounter each other in unexpected places like at the Boston airport, Pasadena Hilton and now on the Sonoma Coast? How many more encounters might there be?
In today’s fractious world when we seem to be more separate and apart from each other than ever before, we seek healing and acceptance in our lives just like the bleeding woman. In God’s world, every encounter with another is a miracle because God in Jesus Christ encountered us in this world as fully human. In God’s world, each of these encounters with Ron is a wonderful miraculous reunion! Let there be more!