Have your surroundings been rearranged on you, taking you away from where you’ve been? Was it a move? A new job? A new circumstance you didn’t ask for?

I was asked those same questions and it didn’t take me long to remember a time like that. I was recently widowed and a music teacher in a small private Christian school. After taking two weeks off for bereavement leave after my husband Bill died, I returned back to work at the school. There was a cocoon of safety there. The staff was small and they cared about me. We all quietly mourned together my loss. It was good to be back to work and not always focus on those losses.

It was a Tuesday in February. My first day back. That afternoon, we were called into a meeting with the principal and superintendent. We always had a meeting on Tuesday afternoons, but not with the superintendent. We sat around the conference table, relaxing after a long day with children, and waited for Mr. Chase to tell us us why he was there. When he broke the news that our school was closing at the end of the school year, we were shocked. We wordlessly walked out of the meeting. Mr. Chase didn’t promise jobs for everyone. For sure I wouldn’t have a job with the school. They already had a music teacher at the Portland campus.

I’d worked at this school for fifteen years and my plans were to finish my teaching here and then retire. Not this year, though. I was too young to retire and there were no funds for me to stop working. I would have to look for another job. Now, not only was I mourning the loss of my husband of forty years, teaching all day, I also had to search for a job to support myself!

At first my goal was to find another job similar to what I was doing. Teaching music. I applied to numerous schools, interviewed at some, and boned up on my secretarial skills if I didn’t find a teaching position. I just needed a job—with benefits. Several months passed. I still had not obtained a position. June was hot on the horizon.

He defends the fatherless and widows….that was me.

Then I had an epiphany. Why not go to where my husband had worked for more than thirty years? They were a loyal family-owned-company who cared about their employees. Would there be something there? I made a few phone calls and applied for a position in production control. I got the job.

It was computer work I’d never done, but I learned the job quickly. I enjoyed learning something new and different. I didn’t have to spend any time after hours like I did at school. At the end of the day, my job was complete. At this job, I worked with many departments and learned more about my husband as I worked there. They knew “George” (that’s what they called him at work), and cared about him. They were happy to meet his widow and transfer that respect and care on to me. I walked down into the machine shop where he worked for years as a journeyman machinist. I wandered in fabrication, where he talked about what they did there. I spent a day in the warehouse, where he, too had worked, stopped by the engineering office at his last position. It was like walking in his footsteps! I grieved as I did this and worked through memories. I talked to coworkers whose names I’d heard Bill mention, saw his name on blueprints. It was the perfect place for me to be. The pay was better and they provided better benefits. I loved my job!

There’s much more to the story. Click on this link, where you can find out more on how God provided me with security: https://redemption-press.com/shop/product/21986 It’s really exciting and when I look back to see how I was loved and cared for by the God of the Universe.

I don’t know your story, but I can tell you God’s hand was on me the whole time I was looking for a job, while I was learning that job and beyond. There’s a lot more to the story, but I’ll save that for another time. Just know this. God cares about you, too.

I love the words to an old hymn written in the 18th Century that applied to me. God gave me the courage that I couldn’t generate on my own. He’ll do the same for you.

Though I feared, I found blessings beyond what I could imagine!