One Year Bible: May 18

After he has gathered his own flock, he walks ahead of them, and they follow him because they know his voice. They won’t follow a stranger; they will run from him because they don’t know his voice.John 10:4-5

May 18

To read today’s portion of scripture, you can purchase The One Year Bible or find the following in your Bible:

1 Samuel 22:1-23:29
John 10:1-21
Psalm 115:1-18
Proverbs 15:18-19

Gabriela was a single mother of one young daughter. She had come to America hoping to find a better life for the two of them. She landed in Marietta, California, and caught the eye of an elder couple who thought they should pray for her, and who asked their weekly prayer group to do the same.

Dale was a single dad of two young children in Arlington, Washington, and his elderly friends would pray for him each week when they gathered with their prayer group.

Someone from Dale’s prayer group up here knew someone from Gabriela’s prayer group there. When all the details fell together, the two groups thought Dale and Gabriela might just be the answer to each other’s needs. So they prayed more earnestly, and then handed Dale Gabriela’s number.

That first phone conversation was tentative. Still, they managed to talk for two hours. The call the next night was right around three hours. And they kept that up for two months, until Dale felt it was time for Gabriela to come up and meet his children.

This was pre-9/11 … back when you could wait for people right there in the terminal. Dale was part of a sea of people all waiting for the plane to disembark.

Gabriela had never seen a picture of Dale. But she told me later that when she entered the terminal and faced those dozens and dozens of strangers, she took one sweep of the crowd, and fixed her eyes on Dale.

“I had fallen in love with his voice, she said. “But I knew his face in an instant.”

We only have a little time to do the same. We fall in love with His voice here, but one day, we’ll see Him there —- and we’ll know His face in an instant.