Doors of Favor

Many of you know that I have an unhealthy love of the television show “Friends”. Before I was married, I thoroughly enjoyed watching the show of a mish-mash group of people who came together and created a “family” out of friends. They did life together. It was an ideal that many, who found themselves alone, longed for. After my come-to-Jesus moment(s), and as my eldest daughter grew into the teen years, I came to find the lifestyles portrayed in “Friends” to be a bit repulsive. I still have a habit of quoting the show, laughing at similar situations, and appreciating the novelty of the memories. There are a couple episodes that keep coming to mind as of late.

As some of you may know, I recently went through the process of a fairly significant move. I’ve lived in Alaska for more than ten years, but we relocated to the east coast. Big. Move. We got rid of 90% of our furniture, packed and stored away some non-essentials, and made our way down to Colorado with a truck and trailer. We did some rearranging with the trailer, so saying “Pivot! Pivot! PIVOT!” received a few laughs. The other that keeps coming to mind is from one in the first season. Rachel is stressing out because she doesn’t have a plan, the stress becomes contagious and Monica asks Phoebe if she has a plan. Phoebe answers that she doesn’t even have a “pla….”

My husband is not the planner that I am. He’s a lot more laid back in his method of planning while I want to (as Junior says on the movie “Storks”) – “Make a plan, stick to the plan; always deliver!” I know that there should be some sort of fluidity with plans. I know that things can pop up that requires an alteration to plans made. I have trouble when there are alterations to plans that were never really made. I joked with my sister-in-law that my plans weren’t even of the jello texture. Like Phoebe, I don’t even have a “pla.”

After all of the alterations to the plan with our move, some of our own decision and others… well, I’ll get to that later… we finally made it to our new home. I’m finally on the other end of this part of the journey and I’ve been able to do a bit of reflecting. Okay, I’ll go ahead and fill you in on part one.

Moving from Alaska to the “lower 48” meant driving through Canada in the midst of their heightened travel restrictions due to the pandemic. My husband had all of his paperwork needed and more, but it was still anyone’s guess whether or not they would let him go through. In my fleeting alone time, I kept finding myself praying for favor; something that I can’t ever remember praying for – favor. The doors for our move had been lining up wide open, one after the other, prayers being answered that were seemingly insignificant gave us confidence in our approach. I told my husband several times in an effort to encourage him that God wouldn’t open all of these doors just to have the Canada Border Control slam a big one shut. Needless to say, he was allowed through with no delay.

I drew the short straw and got to fly with three kiddos (8yo, 6yo, and 4yo), along with ALL of our luggage. We were each allowed two free checked bags (membership matters), each a carry-on, and each a personal item (not to mention car seats – those are always free). Our checked bags were each at max capacity, we each had a rolling carry-on, and we each had a backpack. I was running on one cup of coffee, had no free hands to bring one along (I ended up with the 4yo’s carry-on, too), and I was starting to feel discouraged. After getting through security and to our gate, my mom called saying we had forgotten the car seats and that she was going to try to get them checked for us. They allowed it (door open!).

I also realized, fairly quickly, that our carry-on situation was not a good one. “Ask. The worst they can do is say ‘No’.” I managed to herd the kids and all of the carry-ons up to the desk at our gate and asked if they needed volunteers to check their carry-ons. The employee took one look at us and said that he completely understood and would take care of it. That meant we had 12 free checked bags (car seats included). I kept one of the roll-ons because they had all of the snacks. Another answer to prayer, but still a one-cup day.

Beverage service on flights have been reduced to bottles and cans due to the pandemic; no hot tea or coffee. I kept hearing the same thing go through my mind: “Ask. The worst they can do is say ‘No’.” So when the beverage cart came rolling by, I asked if coffee was an option. “Why, yes… we haven’t had it available, but decided to brew some. Would you like cream or sugar?” Seemingly insignificant door opened. Our second flight was similar with an answer to prayer.

We’re a low-tech family. We have internet and a laptop (you’re welcome), and my hubby and I each have a smart phone. We do not have tablets or Kindles, we don’t have iPads or iPods (I don’t even know what the difference between all of those are), and we don’t have any gaming systems (I kind of miss the Nintendo of the 90’s). The airline we flew with offers the in-flight entertainment that can be streamed on the individual’s personal device – that literally left me to my own devices. Knowing this, I packed all of our old smart phones, one for each kiddo.

I had everything charged but found out on our first flight that they didn’t have the updated programs required, so we went to sharing. The two older kiddos alternated every other 20-minute episode while the youngest was content to color and nap. The second flight was going to be the same set-up. Our seating assignments were shuffled so that we could all sit together, and the airline somehow decided it was a good idea to move us from the back of the plane to row 10. The other traveler on row 10, getting an idea of the sharing set-up, offered a solution. He had multiple devices and was fine with sharing. All of the kiddos were able to watch a movie because of the kindness of a stranger. This reprieve from stress was needed because of what was to come.

We made our way to baggage claim to retrieve our many pieces of luggage. None of it got lost – I almost forgot one, but they called before I left the area. I piled two luggage carts high and still had some pieces that had to be pulled or pushed behind. We had to go to a lower level in order to meet our ride, so we tracked down the elevator and soon discovered that both luggage carts would not fit. I sent the two oldest down together and drilled it into them that we were going to level 4 and they were to wait right there; I would be right down with the youngest. They took the first elevator, and when the second one came, our youngest skipped on ahead of me. Did I mention that two of our bags were long cases? Ever see the funny clip about the dog carrying a stick through the doorway? Before I could rearrange the luggage cart to join my baby on the elevator, the doors shut with her inside.

I went into panic mode… I started throwing luggage into the very next elevator, a stranger who saw what happened started helping by keeping the doors open for me (where were they a minute earlier?). The doors opened on level 4 with my two kiddos patiently waiting, but no sign of my baby. Before I could fully get a prayer started, another elevator opened with a couple escorting a hysterical 4yo. They had seen us together at baggage claim, heard me drilling level 4 into the brains of two of my kiddos, and had found my youngest on level 6. That was provision before a prayer was uttered.

For the first leg of our journey, I saw favor after favor. After the elevator scare, we met our friend who was picking us up (all of our luggage fit in his little car without having to tie anything down on top!). I shared about the car seats, the coffee, the shared extra streaming device, and the attention of strangers finding and returning my youngest. I found out the next morning that his wife, too, had felt led to pray for favor for our move. She had thought it was the weirdest thing at the time – favor? Turned out that we were being led by the Spirit to pray a certain way, and it helped throw doors open wide. God is so very good – I’ve seen it, lived it, and am sharing it. You can see it, live it, and share it, too.