Thankful Thursday

My dear friend Susie writes a post on Thursdays called Thankful Thursdays. She does it in coordination with another blog and it is always encouraging to read her gratitude to God for all the great things He has done in her life. In keeping with Susie's Thankful Thursdays, I thought I would share something that happened to us a few Thursdays ago that we are truly thankful to God for. Thus, my Thankful Thursday post....

We were supposed to leave for Tokyo on Thursday, August 7th, a short visit to Disneyland before heading back to China. But due to poor planning on my part, we had to cancel that portion of our trip. When I called the travel agent to rebook our flight plans I had every intention of leaving for China on Thursday, August 7th. I was tired of traveling and ready to be in my own bed with my own things. My girls, however, wanted to stay longer as there was a free Raven Symone concert at Fiesta Texas on the 7th and they were dying to go. The travel agent could only get us on a flight back to China on the 10th, so whatever prayer my children were praying, it obviously worked.

We were able to make some arrangements for our close friends, the Rodriguez's, to join us at Fiesta Texas on the same day and so instead of boarding a plane to China, I headed to an amusement park. The girls were so excited and we arrived at the park precisely at 10:30 am. Since the concert was free we wanted to be there as soon as the doors opened so we could get tickets. Little did we know that Season Pass holders were allowed to enter the park earlier, sometime around 9:00 am, and by the time Clint and Kayley ran to the ticket office the concert was sold out. I chose to start standing in line for another ride and when I was finally able to contact my friend Lisa via cellphone, she said there were no tickets. I asked how Kayley handled the news and Lisa said she was disappointed but having fun riding rides. I felt terrible for my girls. They always feel like they miss out on so many normal "American" things (although I remind them they get to do and see things other people don't), so I was really hoping they would get this opportunity. It just didn't seem that it was meant to be. God, however, had other plans.

When I finally met up with everyone else I was amazed to find out that Lisa was the new owner of 6 tickets to that evening's concert! The story goes like this: Lisa was waiting on Kayley and her son, Robert, to finish a ride, and she "happened" to sit down next to a woman and start a conversation. Somehow they got around to talking about that night's concert and Lisa mentioned how we wanted to go but were unable to get tickets. That lady looked at her and said she had 6 extra tickets she would be more than happy to give to us since she had 5 boys who had no desire to go. Lisa gladly took them off her hands and joyfully passed them on! We were all so excited and praising God throughout the entire park for His goodness to us when we had all but given up hope.

But wait! That's not the end of this Thankful Thursday story. John and Lisa were celebrating their 15th wedding anniversary that very day and John mentioned to me he would like to Lisa to dinner if I would watch their kids during the concert. I told him it would be no problem since we had the tickets, but I wasn't sure if their two year old would need a ticket or not. John said if they didn't let her in with us they would just take her to dinner with them. I was hoping that wouldn't be the case and of course, God didn't disappoint. While we stood in line to get into the amphitheater, we talked about the situation we were facing and how we would handle it. The lady behind us "happened" to overhear our conversation and offered us an extra ticket she had so we could take the baby in! God just seemed to shower us with blessings all day long!

Needless to say, the kids LOVED the concert, John and Lisa celebrated their anniversary in peace and we had hearts overflowing with gratitude at the goodness and greatness of our God all around! It was definitely a Thankful Thursday.