Yes, you read that right, God uses zip ties. Okay, please allow me to explain. Several months ago, my husband (a huge lover of zip ties and bungee straps) was working on a project that required zip ties. With said project complete and one remaining zip tie leftover, my husband handed it to me for safe keeping as he gathered his other project tools. Placing that zip tie on the porch of our small deer blind, I went about picking up pieces of scrap wood, soon forgetting about the zip tie as my husband and I made our way back to our house. No biggie, it was a zip tie after all.
The following day, during my morning walk, I remembered the forgotten zip tie, picking it up from where I’d left it the night before. After tucking it safely in the pocket of my jeans, I continued on with my morning walk.
As I maneuvered through our woods, tripping over sticks and protruding tree roots, that zip tie managed to fall out of my pocket. As dumb as it seems, I wanted to find it, and so I retraced my steps, hoping to do just that. Basically, I was looking for a needle in a haystack. Disappointed that I’d lost at my own game of finding a brown zip tie in a mass of wet leaves and tree branches, I headed back to the house.
Several days later, heading out for my morning walk, I was feeling somewhat down. I had allowed the negativity of others to poison me with doubt to the point that I had begun questioning whether or not I actually knew God’s voice.
I had always been so certain of doing what I knew God was leading me to do, but on that day I found myself wondering. Questioning whether or not God even saw me, let alone spoke to me. “How do I know if it’s you God, leading me to do those things that I feel led to do?” I silently questioned Him.
Now when I say that God uses zip ties, this is what I mean. Within seconds of my question, the thought of that zip tie popped into my head. And with the thought of that zip tie, came the certainty that God was going to show me exactly where that zip tie was located.
There was no negative naysayers around to convince me otherwise. I knew that internal voice willing me to take a step forward and look down was none other than God’s voice. And so it was with one step forward, I looked down and saw that (no longer lost) zip tie. Triumphantly I picked it up, mentally high fiving God and thanking Him for allowing me to find it.
Coincidence? For believers, there are no coincidences and I for one believe completely in a God who loves me enough to use zip ties to prove it! For two days, traveling the same exact path, I’d not seen that zip tie. Even on the day when I’d intentionally been looking for it, it had remained lost.
In the exact moment, I needed to find it, it was found. God had shown me that I was metaphorically walking the very path that He had intended me to walk. He had allowed me to see amidst the mud and fallen leaves, one little zip tie and with that I realized that despite the turmoil I sometimes face as a human, God saw me and with Him, I would never be lost.
What an extraordinary thing to grasp, that if it’s important to us, it’s important to Him, even something as silly as finding a lost zip tie.