One day while living on the campus of Christ for the Nations in Dallas, Texas, a maintenance man came to wax our floors. I began a conversation to acquaint myself with this international student who had come to the U.S. for Bible training. He told me that he was from Romania. While he worked I shared with him about our family moving to Texas after having lived in the Midwest all of our lives. After explaining we once were pastors in Central Illinois, I suddenly remembered an event which happened with another Romanian, months before we were invited to work and minister at Christ for the Nations.

While pastoring we had friends who were peers in our citynamed, Jack and Lynn. They had invited us to visit their church to hear a guest speaker from Romania.  During that season, Tony and I had been a bit discouraged and we readily accepted their offer.

After the evening service we joined their church family in a time of fellowship and dinner. Our friends asked if we would mind if they brought the Romanian guest over to pray for us. Once again their offer seemed timely. When the guest came over and conversed with us he asked if he might pray for us in his native language. We agreed. I remember thinking at the time how very long his prayer over us was and the blind faith we had, but curious as to what in the world he was asking God for in our behalf! My huge imagination went to work later, wondering if he was praying for us to live in a third world nation or be asked to make a major change in our comfortable life for the sake of the gospel. I halfway comforted myself and felt sure God did not speak Romanian—or did He?

Now, as I stood telling my new international friend about our Romanian exchange, I realized God’s perfect timetable. It had been exactly two years since a foreigner prayed over us in a foreign tongue, and we had ended up in a foreign Southwest state with new excitement and fresh assignments from God. I marveled in that moment, wondering if we were now living in the answer to that Romanian’s prayer. After listening intently, the young man looked into my eyes and said with astonishment, “That man is my father.”

What have you dared to ask God about recently? His plans and purposes are intricate and beautiful. Nothing is foreign to the One who knows the beginning from the end.