THE TRIQUETRA OF LIFE: Wisdom, Wealth, and Wellness

That Only a Child Could Explain

I read Daniel Sadasivan’s article in the July/August issue of New Oxford Review about nurturing a childlike faith in God. Should I relate what happened to me yesterday—something only a child would readily believe? Of course, scoffers will shake their heads, but I finally decided to share my experience anyway. Perhaps someone will take it to heart and be encouraged.

I had scheduled a walk-in at Labcorp late Wednesday morning. My doctor’s appointment was the following Monday, so I wanted the results on time. I also reasoned that few patients would be there around 11:00 a.m. Instead, I found at least twenty people already waiting. After I registered, the kiosk informed me that the estimated wait would be five hours. I registered for a 3:00 p.m. appointment and left.

On the way home—call it a little bird, if you like—something “tweeted” that I should go to the main Labcorp office six miles east. I hesitated, but that “tweet” persisted, even though I had already passed the freeway entrance. Finally, needing my Monday test results, I turned around and headed there. For some inexplicable reason, I began affirming, “There will be only three patients sitting in that waiting room.” I found myself repeating the affirmation, only half believing it would come true.

Well, sit down for this. When I entered that office, only three patients were sitting in the waiting room. I smiled to myself at the coincidence, not quite fathoming the unusual convergence of events. While a phlebotomist drew my blood, I told her about the other office stacked up with patients. She smiled and said, “We usually have up to twenty patients here before noon, but today has been a freaky day.” I hardly felt the needle prick. I was too startled by what she had just said.

Driving home, I recalled the passage in which Jesus instructed His disciples, “Go into the village ahead of you, and at once you will find a donkey tied there, with her colt by her” (Matt. 21:2). That verse has always intrigued me. It suggests either that Jesus already knew the animals would be there and that their owner would release them, or that He quietly arranged the scene at precisely the right moment, much as a stage director prepares the setting before the curtain rises.

It is easy to dismiss such passages as biblical exaggeration—until something like this happens to you. Questions filled my mind as I drove home. Did my subconscious somehow know that exactly three patients would be waiting there? Or did my quiet affirmations somehow reshuffle the deck? Perhaps it was a combination of both.

Then another thought came to me. Adults instinctively begin calculating probabilities, weighing subconscious perceptions, searching for various psychological explanations, or settling on coincidence. Even if an event qualified as a miracle, few would dare call it one. A child would ask a much simpler question: “Didn’t God just help you?” Perhaps that is why Jesus told us to become like little children. A child would reach that conclusion in about two seconds.

Richard M. DellOrfano spent ten years on a cross-country pilgrimage following Christ’s instruction to minister without possessions. He is completing his autobiography: Path Perilous, My Search for God and the Miraculous. Several excerpts are located under the Autobio category. Pending publication date: January, 2027.