Seeing God's Hand

Our stake is hosting an adult Institute class to discuss the topics that the youth will be discussing in their Sunday School, priesthood, and YW classes.  It is being taught by a wonderful man from our ward, and it is held on Thursday nights.  The first meeting was last week, and it was delightful; so I decided to go again last night.

We had wonderful discussion about and from the scriptures, and Brother Hughes gave us homework:  Look for the hand of  God in your life daily and write it down each day.

Yesterday we had freezing rain here.  I don't remember ever experiencing freezing rain, but it was literally raining ice.  I think you'd sort of have to see it to understand it.  Anyway, I left home over an hour earlier than usual, and when I first left, it was just rain.  By the time I was about halfway to work, though, it was ice.  About 100 yards ahead of me I witnessed a full-sized pickup truck spin from the left side of the freeway to the right, back to the left side and back to the right again.  Incredibly, the truck didn't hit any other vehicles, and it came to a stop just beside the guard rail on the right, facing oncoming traffic but out of the way.  When that skid started, I hit my brakes, only to find that all I could do was skid.  Fortunately I had plenty of room to pump (and thank goodness for ABS!) and slow, and so did the vehicles travelling behind me.  Had it happened during my regular commute time, there would have been much more traffic, and the outcome would probably have been much different.

It could have been really ugly (more for the driver of the truck than for me), but I was reminded of something I'd been prompted to do before I left home, and I feel sure that God's hand was in my safety on that drive yesterday, based at least in part on my obedience to that prompting.

I told a number of people about that incident yesterday as we discussed the strange weather.  You know what, though?  After Institute when I came home and was doing my homework, it took me a few minutes to remember that specific experience when it came time to do my homework.  I am really grateful to have taken the opportunity to ponder the day and recognize the hand of God in my life.