When God Interrupts Breakfast
Our theology group (fancy name for book club) started our Saturday meeting like every other. We found our table, ordered our drinks, assessed the menu, & shared some laughs.
We were settling in for a couple of hours of edifying, Christ centered fellowship, when we were interrupted.
This interruption didn’t come by way of a smart phone, or Chinette (our waitress), or even one of IHOP’s finest breakfast platters. The interruption was ordained by a sovereign, creative, holy, and all powerful God.
It was the morning we met Andrew (name changed for article).
Andrew recognized us from across the restaurant. He had seen each of us at church a few weeks back and wanted to say hello. However, God did not interrupt our breakfast for a simple greeting. He had something greater in mind.
Before we knew it, Andrew had joined our table and was laying out his heart for each of us to hear. He held nothing back. He shared about his family, his passions, his business, and his struggles. He shared about his desire to connect more intimately with a God he knows exists. He shared about his desire to get connected with a body of believers. He shared that he never had fully given his life to Christ.
Talk about a glorious interruption!
God had placed each of us there in his perfect timing. We had a chance to share the truth of the gospel. The new life that Jesus offers, not to those who do their best to clean themselves up, but to those who come completely broken before him. We shared the truth of salvation by grace through faith. The four of us had a chance to pray over him before he went on his way.
“I will see you tomorrow at church,” were the last words we heard.
We praised God for interweaving our lives together. We knew a seed had been sown. We rested together on the truth of 1 Corinthians 3:7, that only God could cause that seed to grow.
God had allowed us to be part of the plan; a plan that involved an interrupted breakfast that would bring glory to God.
As I walked to Sunday School the next morning, I heard applause from the sanctuary at our early service. I peeked in the door and I saw Andrew standing at the front of the church. Andrew had given his life to the Lord Jesus Christ! God had performed a miracle right before our eyes. Andrew had been dead, but now he was alive.
We serve a God that loves to interrupt lives. Whether it was Abraham on Mount Moriah, or Matthew at his tax booth, or Saul on the road to Damascus, God interrupted the lives of these men and they were forever changed. These men had plans, but God had something else in mind.
My prayer is that each of us will humble ourselves and allow God to interrupt the plans we have for our lives. I pray we will continue to rely on the transforming power of the gospel that Andrew experienced that day.
God will interrupt, but he will never disappoint.
Michael Holmquist is a husband, father of two, school teacher, and missionary, who leads his family each summer to leave Houston, Texas in order to live the mission together in Gdansk, Poland.
