NIGHT
It was
eleven o'clock, on a winter's night. as my wife, Trixie and I
made our way home, strolling through the streets of our town,
after having spent some hours giving out our "Jesus"
leaflets and stickers to the young people who were out late. It
was dark , bitter cold and having had a friendly chat with many
teenagers, we had decided to call it a night.
Just
then we were approached by a number of teenaged girls,
who looked agitated and upset. They
explained that one of them had lost her valuable watch, which had
been given to her as a present.
"Where have you been?" I asked.
"Everywhere - all over town." she replied.
"Don't worry," I found myself saying, "we'll pray
that Jesus will show us where to find it.
"Okay," they said.
I was very surprised they hadn't laughed at me.
As we
left them and continued our journey, Trixie said to me,
"Are you sure we'll find it?"
"I don't know," I answered.
The two of us climbed some stone steps that led us on to the flat
roofs of some shops in our precinct.
"I saw them up here earlier this evening," I said,
"perhaps she dropped it somewhere up here."
It was quite dark and we prayed quietly as we kicked our way
through rubbish and leaves, without much hope.
"It could be anywhere," I thought, "and I've gone
and put God to the test. What will they think when we don't find
it?"
I called Trixie over,
"It's no use, let's go home; it's getting late!"
Down
the concrete stairway we stepped, greeting two young lads, who
were standing at the bottom. I recognised one of them, so we
chatted for a bit and I introduced Trixie. She was a little
embarrassed and mentioned we were looking for a watch. They
weren't all that surprised and I thought that maybe we shouldn't
have said anything , in case they decided there was something
valuable around that was up for grabs!