The Lost Bag
Many years ago, when I was a little girl, the Lord taught me a very important lesson. I have not forgotten it because it made a very big impression on me. You might find the story very funny, but for me it was very serious at that time.
When I was young, my parents did not have much money. We always had enough food to eat and clothes to wear, but there was not enough money to buy new clothes very often. Actually it was very seldom when we would get any new clothes. We usually wore whatever we inherited from cousins and friends.
One day I was happy though. It was new year’s eve, and that has always been a family evening at our home. We would have a special dinner and then we would worship together. After that we would give each other presents. That night I got a new pair of tights made of a special kind of wool, for winter time. I was so excited that I had gotten something new to wear, something that no one else had used first. It was special for me.
But before long a tragedy happened. That winter was terribly cold, with lots of snow. We lived on a farm in the country, and one day there was so much snow that we couldn’t drive away from our farm with the car. My mother, who worked in the laundry at the College, had to go to work, so my father took her the six kilometers on the tractor.
Since mommy worked in the laundry, we did not have a washing machine at home, she just always took our clothes with her to work and washed them there. That day our clothes were in the laundry and we needed to get them home. Daddy put them in a big bag and took them home on the tractor. When he reached the farm there was no bag on the tractor any longer. What had happened to it? It must have fallen off somewhere in the snow. Daddy went back to search for it, but he didn’t find anything. What a tragedy! It was especially sad for me because my new tights were missing. Oh, I could have cried. After all this time I had received something new, and now it was lost.
Later that day, after the road was ploughed, my brothers and sister and I started out for school on our bicycles. We had to ride on the same road that father had driven on with the tractor that morning. All the way to school I looked carefully beside the road for the bag, but I did not see it anywhere. One day, two days, three days passed by, but I still could not find the bag, and I decided that someone must have stolen it. A whole week passed by, and I was very sad. Finally I knelt down and prayed to God. We had already been praying to God that He would help us find the bag, but this was different. I told God how much I wanted my tights back, but I always told Him that if it was not His will, than I would accept it. After that prayer I was much happier. I had accepted whatever would happen and had laid it in the Lord’s hands. The same day on the way home from school, I had a big surprise. There beside the road, I saw a bag under some small bushes. I was overwhelmed with joy. Quickly, I went home and told Daddy to go and get the bag.
Why hadn’t I seen the bag earlier? For one week we had all been passing by the bag two times a day, but had not seen it. I believe the Lord wanted to teach me a very important lesson, one which I would never forget. When we pray, we should say, “Thy will be done. “Before the Lord answered my prayer, my will had to be surrendered to His will. May the Lord help you always to surrender your will to His.
Lena Clerc