Godmade and Unnatural

Why are pennies so easy to find?

I'm sure you're tired of hearing about that ridiculous barefoot walk from weeks ago, but I'm still not done with it. Sorry. It turns out, pennies are the gift that keep on giving and in this case, they keep giving me ideas. 

So why are they so easy to find? 

Maybe you don't find pennies easily, but I feel like a master penny (and washer, bolt, paperclip) finder. I'll be walking jauntily, not really paying attention to the road (I'm getting better at looking where I'm going), when out of the corner of my eye I'll glimpse the familiar shape of a coin. Without even seeing it directly I just know it’s a penny. Which is cool. It really is. And handy. At this point I need to get a larger jar for my collection. 

I just also think it’s a little too easy. 

I can't walk anywhere without finding a bit of metal. I've started walking to church every week and without fail, I find a treasure on my walk. Folks, there are only so many different ways I can walk to church and I don't change up my routine that much. There shouldn't be so many pennies and washers waiting for me no matter which route I take. Yet there they are. 

Which is why I was wondering about them. They stand out. They almost beg to be found. They seemingly just appear in my path. It's weird. And a little unnatural. 

And after that long mental process, I finally turned a corner (both in my mind and on my walk). The reason pennies are so easy to find is because they are unnatural. They're manmade and perfectly round, perfectly shaped, consistently sized and weighted. They don't fit in with anything else in nature. I've never seen a rock just randomly sitting on the street that was an exact circle and the same thickness across. It just doesn't happen. Nature doesn't make circles. It makes rocks smooth and round but that is very different from being identical and circular. 

Hence, pennies stand out no matter where they are.

Of course, my brain took things one step further. I started wondering about the things God made. He made nature after all so naturally nature is natural. He made me, so that must mean I'm natural.

Except that compared with every other thing in nature, human beings don't fit the (non-existent) nature mold. We stand out like pennies against rocks. God made everything, yes. He made nature. He made us. But we're the only ones He keeps in his workshop after we're created. Nature, He makes and then lets go. It lives its system and lives it beautifully. But us. He keeps us. He melts us. Mints us. Polishes us. Shapes us. We go from being natural, rough and oddly shaped stone or chunks of raw metal to being circular, symmetrical, shiny, precious. Geometrical. Shaped. Purified.

We become Godmade and unnatural. 

And as we become Godmade, as we become peculiar, different, and unnatural, things begin to change. I mean external things, not just internal. We begin to interact differently with our world and it begins to act differently with us. Just as I respond differently to manmade and unnatural pennies, I think Mother Earth, the Universe, God (whatever speaks to you) interacts differently with a Godmade and unnatural person.

I pick pennies up. I move them. I inspect them. I treasure them. Sometimes I give them away. I write about them. I use them. I give them and receive them. So too, does God with us. He picks up His Godmade people. He moves them. He treasures them. He inspects them and uses them. He gives them away. 

Luckily, because we are more animate than pennies, He also speaks to us. Gives to us. Answers us. 

The more I let God make my life the more the coincidences pile up like pennies. At first its easy to think it's just random. Sure, I've gone this way before but maybe someone just happened to walk by and randomly drop a washer (because every normal person carries those on them all the time). Yeah, the thing I was hoping for and praying for and expecting happened but it was, of course, completely random. God doesn't just drop blessings in front of me all the time. That would be unnatural.

But what if He does, guys? What if He is providing unnatural coincidences and perfect circumstances for us all the time? What if He is responding to our questions and fulfilling our expectations? 

I one-hundred percent believe that every small thing in life is representative of something larger. A cell is a closed system that functions in the same way the body (also a closed system) functions which is quite similar to how the world (again, a closed system) behaves. I take that to mean that if something happens between me and pennies on the road, then that same thing can (and probably is) happening between God and me on my road. 

Crazy, right? That God could be actively placing unnatural opportunities (that merely appear natural because we see them so frequently (astounding to consider how frequently this has to be happening for us to think it's natural)) all around me. It would be crazy but for the overflowing jar of washers and pennies on my bookshelf and a life full of the un-explainable and, apparently, Godmade and unnatural.