...Never Fails...

...People use a lot of catchphrases to describe things that happen.  The older I get, the more I find myself turning to a few of my favorites: 1) hindsight is 20/20, and 2) everything happens for a reason.  The more I think about it, the more I realize that they also help each other out.  Everything happens for a reason, sure!  But we usually only realize that after the fact, because hindsight is 20/20. 
 
I was going to talk about another catchphrase people tend to use when things don’t go as planned - how life never fails to throw us curveballs.  At the very moment we think we have everything lined up perfectly, and things are finally starting to fall into place, something happens to mess it all up.  It never fails...

Over the past two weeks, I’ve written three different “articles” for this newsletter.  I wasn’t feeling the first one so I wrote another one.  I felt pretty good about the second one: entitled “Never Fails”.
 
People use a lot of catchphrases to describe things that happen.  The older I get, the more I find myself turning to a few of my favorites: 1) hindsight is 20/20, and 2) everything happens for a reason.  The more I think about it, the more I realize that they also help each other out.  Everything happens for a reason, sure!  But we usually only realize that after the fact, because hindsight is 20/20. 
 
I was going to talk about another catchphrase people tend to use when things don’t go as planned - how life never fails to throw us curveballs.  At the very moment we think we have everything lined up perfectly, and things are finally starting to fall into place, something happens to mess it all up.  It never fails.
 
I was going to end with how, even though IT never fails, neither does God.  God is always there with a pick-me-up and a plan.  We may not know what the plan is, and we may not realize the plan until it has been completed, but the fact remains, God never fails.
 
God is always there with a solution to all of our problems.  Monday morning, I was stressing out about the weather and how we were going to get all our students to our field trip that afternoon and what I was going to do.  I was in a small panic when I was reminded that I should probably just lay it at God’s feet and let him take care of it.  Three minutes later (no joke) I get the word that our school district was cancelling school, and just like that, all of my morning problems were solved.
 
School was cancelled but we decided to have a ZEL meeting anyways.  Afterall, we have our biggest fundraiser of the year coming up and, you know what they say, “measure twice, cut once”.  So, a small group was gathered, talking about this, that, and the other thing when we received word that something terrible had happened.   
 
On Monday night, the McCloskeys lost almost everything they own in a house fire.  The wonderful news is that they are all okay and no one was hurt.  The bad news is that everything is gone.  The silver lining is that they belong to Zion – the most amazing place in the world.
 
As they always do, Zion went to work.  Before the meeting was over, a plan to gather groceries and necessities was mapped out.  By the end of the night, the trustees and school board were brainstorming ways to help.  There are probably even more things at work that I’m not aware of.  That’s Zion, and that’s what we do.  That’s what we’ve always done, and it’s what we will always do.  We are a family – the most amazing family ever.
 
The McCloskeys need our help.  We are asking Tiger Nation (past, present, and future – family and freinds) to rally around one of our own.  At Zion, we know that our family reaches far beyond those we see in the halls each school day or in the pews each Sunday. We need your help to not only spread the word, but to donate.  Please help this wonderful family as they pick up the pieces and keep moving forward. 
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Zion will be collecting a door offering at church over the next two Sundays.  If you are able, we ask that you please donate.  Donations will also be collected through the office as well, for those who would like to mail a donation or drop one off.  We have also set-up a Go Fund Me page that can be accessed through both the church and school websites or through our Facebook page.  We encourage those who are able, to please share that post so we can reach as many people as possible.  Let’s show the McCloskey’s that although life never fails to mess up our plans, God has his own plan and IT never fails!

Once a tiger, always a tiger!