Ear Plugs

Weird title you might say. And it may well be. But stay with me to have your theological juices stretched. “Through ear plugs,” I hear you cry! Well, hang in there and you can be the judge. You may or may not remember that last Christmas (that was before COVID if you believe life existed before COVOD), I had a blocked ear. I love to swim and I evidently got water in my ear and it got blocked. I went to the ear doctor (not sure what the correct title is) and had my ears syringed to get the water out. I never had problems with water in my ears when I went swimming until then. However, it seemed to start a trend. So last week I decided to buy ear plugs to end the trauma of getting water in my ears while swimming. I already wear goggles and a nose clip to protect me from the chlorine, and I hated the thought of adding ear plugs to the mix. But I decided to give it a go and see what happened.. So, on Thursday I paid £8 for ear plugs. All seemed to be going well until length number 12. when the right ear plug came out of my ear into the water. I felt my only option was to keep swimming without the ear plug. I have tried to look for nose clips that I dropped into the water and it’s almost impossible to find them. Other people swimming or floating, or doing whatever they are doing make the water choppy and it’s not helpful if you trying to find something that is small and the colour of the water! So I swam on, muttering under my breath about how useless the ear plugs were and how I’d wasted £8. (I didn’t actually mutter anything. That would be silly when swimming. I did it all in my mind. Just didn’t want you to think I’m really stupid!) I swam on and completed my mile (64 lengths if you’re interested - metric mile). And then I decided I would look for the ear plug. Here’s what I figured: it would float; I was swimming in a lane and there was no-one else in the lane so the water in the lane was now calm; it wouldn’t be able to cross the lane boundary; what did I have to lose? So, I began to walk the lane from one end of the pool to the other. (People sometimes do that in the pool to stretch muscles so it’s not as weird as it sounds. Honesty!) I completed one length looking from side to side to see if my ear plug was caught in the lane marker. Didn’t find it. Turned round and began to walk back to the shallow end. And then I remembered something that happened in Nefyn many years ago. My friend Neil, who followed me as leader of the mission, lost his glasses in the sea one day. He told me he prayed that he would find them when he looked for them because Jesus once got a coin from the mouth of a fish! He really did tell me that! And, he went back to the beach, walked into the water and found his glasses! Remarkable. So, I decided to pray that I would find my ear plug! I really did: “God, be great if I could find my ear plug!” And…I did! No sooner had I finished my prayer, I turned my head to the right and there it was, caught in the lane marker. I was genuinely surprised, delighted and confused all in one. What had just happened? Was that coincidence? Would I have found the ear plug anyway? Did God really help me find an ear plug? Surely there are better things God could be doing than finding ear plugs in a swimming pool for a grumpy swimmer. Surely there are far more important and significant things God should do. I felt, genuinely, that I should say “Thank you!” It leaves me with lots of questions. It leaves me right in the middle of the mystery that is God. But perhaps most of all it leaves with a challenge: how do I respond to a God who answers prayer? And maybe that is a challenge for you too.