Donkey Days
Friday (September 26)
Donkey Days
1 Samuel 9:3-4
Now the donkeys of Kish, Saul’s father, were lost. So Kish said to Saul his son, “Take one of the young men with you, and arise, go and look for the donkeys. And he passed through the hill country of Ephraim and passed through the land of Shalishah, but they did not find them. And they passed through the land of Shaalim, but they were not there. Then they passed through the land of Benjamin, but did not find them.
How many times have you gotten out of bed in the morning, anticipating a day packed full of opportunities, some you’d had on the calendar for a while and were looking forward to, only to cancel all those plans due to a high fever or a flat tire or flooding in your basement or a lost wallet or even that terrible realization as you pull the handle of your car door that you’ve locked your keys in the house? Even the loss of little things can wreak havoc on our well-made plans.
There’s a creek called Campbell Creek about half an hour from my house, located along a rough forest trail deep down in Raven Rock State Park, so I traveled there one day to write devotionals. I parked in my usual spot, grabbed my fold-up lawn chair and backpack and made my way down the winding, mountainous trail. After hiking a mile in, I came to a little wooden bridge that marked a sudden change in topography. To the left of the bridge, the trail darted upward along a high ridge. To the right of the trail, the dense forest led to a quiet cove on the creek that no one ever seemed to venture to; so I went that way. Finally, I arrived. I placed my chair on the pebble beach, opened my backpack to retrieve the three simple things I needed for work- Bible, notepad, and pen—only to discover that my pen was missing. I turned my backpack inside and out but to no avail. And my entire day of writing got derailed because of it.
What we’ll discover in 1 Samuel 9 is that even donkeys don’t go missing on accident. Even our forgotten keys and stolen wallets and lost Bic pens aren’t a coincidence. In fact, sometimes those things that feel at first like setbacks will, in God’s perfect timing, lead to our greatest successes.