When I left work this evening, I knew I was going to be writing a blog entry when I got home. What I didn’t know was that it would be this blog entry.Funny how something that took about 2 minutes could change so much.

But first I’ll need to give a little background. What you will need to understand is that I am a cessationist who does not want to be a cessationist. In other words, I wish that God communicated via signs and wonders to people today, but I just can’t believe He ever does.

Especially given my life. Every time that I’ve thought I saw a sign from God and then acted upon it, my action was exactly what I shouldn’t have done. If I interpreted something as meaning X, it really meant ~X. Obviously, it didn’t take long for me to decide that I was no good at figuring out what “signs” meant. And it wasn’t much of a step beyond that to the conclusion that if God really wanted me to do something, He’d make it crystal clear so that I couldn’t misunderstand it. Ergo, it wouldn’t be in a “sign” format—it’d be plain as day.

Still, events happen in my life that just seem like they were planned out by God in intricate detail, such that they just “ought” to have some kind of significance above and beyond what they are! And indeed I can sometimes see events like these when I look back on my life. Unfortunately, I can never see them looking forward. That is, I am great at causality in interpreting the past; I’m horrible at prediction.

Which brings me to today. This afternoon I saw a couple of humorous videos on YouTube during me break. One of my co-workers, Travis, enjoys similar humor to what I enjoy. He also happened to be running the front desk this evening. So, at closing time, I got to the lobby where I work and I talked with Travis.

Travis knew of another video similar to one of the videos I described. So he turned his computer back on and went to the site to show it to me. We watched it, and then we talked.

When it was all said and done, it was over 30 minutes later than normal that I left work. And at that time, I knew I was going to jump online and try to find SpideyGeek to send her some of the links to the YouTube videos too.

Needless to say, I wasn’t thinking about much of anything beyond that as I walked toward the bus terminal to begin my commute home. Then, as I crossed the street, I realized that I recognized the woman coming toward me on the sidewalk in front of me! She was one of my old friends from Starbucks who had left to become a teacher.

It’s hard to explain how I feel about Kelly. She is the kind of woman whom I wish I would ask out, but who I know I never will. Not because I’m afraid she’d say no, but because I only think I should ask her out when I’m not talking with her. When we’re talking, thoughts like that just sorta vanish. We’re just chilling in the moment as good friends.

I hadn’t really thought about Kelly in months. Life just sorta moved on and everything continued to change in the world, etc. And then suddenly there she was and my first thought was, “Why are you torturing me like this, God? I was perfectly fine in my own little universe, had a good grasp on reality and all that, without You having to bring up these stupid questions of signs!”

You see, when you’re approaching thirty and you don’t have a ring on that finger in today’s culture, there’s a lot of stress. And I really like Kelly. So even if I don’t necessarily have conscious feelings that I am “falling” for her, I immediately go there anyway: Is she the one? Is this a sign from God? What are the odds?

The odds question is one that really irks me too. If I hadn’t seen those funny videos on YouTube earlier this afternoon, none of this would have happened. I wouldn’t have stopped by the front desk for so long and talked with Travis—or if I did, he wouldn’t have spent the time it took to reboot his computer to show me the video he knew of that lasted 6 minutes. We wouldn’t have been talking about the same subjects, and thus it’s virtually impossible that our conversation would have lasted the exact same amount of time as it did this evening. And that would mean that Kelly and I would have missed each other because I would have been at the bus station a different time than when we met on the sidewalk.

But I also know that this doesn’t quantify as a sign! A) If it was a sign, I’ve already misread it (judging from past experience). B) If it’s a sign, God needs to bash me over the head with it instead of just making me blog about it.

So, instead of coming home in a comedic mindset, eager to share something funny with the world, I come home conflicted. All my logic has been run through the meat grinder so that nothing makes sense (and nothing will until I sleep on it, wake up, and can pretend that life is “normal” again). See, that’s just it: even though I tell myself this wasn’t a sign, there’s a part of me that thinks it is. Even though I never interpret them right, there’s a part of me that think this time I will.

And it bugs the snot out of the cynical, skeptical part of me that is my usual self. I like my world to be in its nice, neat little box that “makes sense to me.” And when things like this happen, it doesn’t fit that box. And it is so, so irritating to me!