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A month or so after our wedding, my wife and I went to Sears to look at washers and dryers. This was the beginning of our life together, and we’d already bought a lot of stuff for our new apartment: furniture, curtains, and all the other things young couples need. We’d bought a car, too, as neither of us had our own. The Friday we went to Sears, we were really just browsing...
Our apartment complex had a laundromat, and although its location was slightly inconvenient, we didn’t feel we had to have a washer and dryer right away. We planned on looking in the paper to find used ones we could afford. In the meantime, though, we decided to swing by Sears
.
Our window shopping didn’t last long. We were soon hooked on the most expensive set in the store. The Sears salesman told us that he could get us credit and started right in on the process of putting us in debt. Fortunately we were turned down because we’d had so many credit checks done in recent weeks—when we’d looked into various apartment possibilities and when we’d bought the car.
We really weren’t disappointed when the deal fell through. We’d just gone to look, after all, and didn’t have our hearts set on getting a washer and dryer.
We came home from Sears and packed for a weekend campout with our youth group without giving any more thought to our shopping excursion. When we returned home on Sunday afternoon, though, we discovered a couple of weird messages on our answering machine: The delivery guys from Sears wondered where we were. They had our washer and dryer.
I called Sears immediately and spent an hour trying to convince them that they were mistaken: We’d never purchased any washer or dryer. Finally they put me on the line with the salesman who’d helped us. He clearly remembered that we’d paid cash. There was no shortage in the register that night; there was no way to trace anything; we’d paid cash; end of story.
The next day they delivered our brand-new, deluxe washer and dryer!
We still wonder...did God provide for us through someone in the church or through some other means? We have no idea—only gratitude and awe.
Chris Condit is a youth minister in Pennsylvania.
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