Saturday, May 4, 2013

Discarded Treasures


Joy Sutton
One of my hobbies is going to garage sales.  I like exploring to see if there are any treasures in what others discard.  I'd like to tell you about two of my adventures.

While heading home in the car one day, I spied a trash pile along the roadside that contained an item that caught my eye.  "Yard art piece, maybe?" I thought.  I stopped.  It was the last hour of a garage/estate sale.  Pieces not sold were being put out on the curb to be hauled away.

I struck up a conversation with Alice, the lady holding the sale, and learned that this home had experienced a tragedy.  The house was owned by her brother, who was now in jail.  His wife and son had fled to Australia, where she was from, to escape an abusive marriage.  Alice said she had flown in from Wisconsin just for the weekend to have the sale and to clear out her brother's house.  All things had to go.  She gladly let me take the piece of  "yard art" from the curb.  Living nearby, I told her I would come back soon.
I hurried home to get my hubby and return.  We gave the lady $20 for a few other items we wanted.  She offered us anything else we wanted at no additional charge.  It was during this hunt that I saw a Women of Faith Study Bible (NIV version). 

In my 55 years of life I had never really been a Bible reader.  The scripture I had received came from church services.  In the past whenever I had tried to read a Bible, I had found too many words on each page and many of them were not easy for me to understand.  I wasn't drawn to continue reading.

On this day, however, I saw a Bible that was reader-friendly.  On each page there was one column of well-spaced scripture with easy to read wording and an explanation sidebar.  There were also many informative pages at the back such as a glossary and atlas.  I thought, perhaps, this would be a good one to try. 

Now I have been reading from this Bible daily for years.  How fortunate that God provided this occasion to put it into my hands!  Reading it has brought me so much closer in my walk with the Lord. I pray that the woman who left the Bible behind has found refuge for herself and her son back home in Australia.  I pray also that though she may have had to leave her Bible behind, her faith has travelled with her.  Her loss has become my gain.

My other adventure was on a Sunday afternoon walk with my dog. I came upon another garage sale.  I looked over all the items, but was not particularly interested in anything.  However, a set of four videos titled "Matthew: The Visual Bible" did catch my eye.  My first thought was that I had only 95 cents in my pocket, and that would not be enough to buy it.  Then I changed my mind.  "All the seller can say is no."  Hesitantly, I asked the man holding the sale if he would be willing to take my 95 cents for the set.   He did. 
The dialogue on this set of videos is word-for-word scripture from the NIV version of the Bible.  The actor portraying Jesus is outstanding.  After watching the videos, I wanted so much to be able to share them with others that I then bought a DVD copy of the set. Since then my husband Jim and I have shared "Matthew" during Lenten evening services at Good Shepherd, as well as with our other home church in North Carolina.  I have also been able to lend it to friends. 

These two adventures just go to show...You never know when you start your day where your journey will lead you.  My fondness for garage sales actually led me further along my faith journey.  In fact, I was able to find precious treasures amongst the discards. His mysterious ways!

No comments:

Post a Comment