When I got back from the “Pilgrimage of Peace” hosted by the Korean churches in the Seoul area, I downloaded the photographs from the weekend. Much to my surprise, on my camera were some pictures that I had not taken.

The pictures were of our busload of WCC Assembly participants singing for the Ansan Jeil Presbyterian Church, where we worshiped on Sunday morning. I had left my camera in the pew when we went up front to sing, and someone from the congregation sitting nearby must have picked it up and taken the pictures for me.

This Korean Christian sister or brother must have known I would love to have those pictures, and indeed I do! It was a wonderful, surprising, unexpected gift.

One of the speakers used the phrase “some invisible hand” in Tuesday’s plenary session. He was telling a story from the life of the indigenous people of Canada–but as I heard him say that phrase my mind went off on a tangent and I thought of my unknown picture taker.

And I thought, is that how God works? How often does God show up unexpectedly in our lives? Sometimes very quietly. Sometimes invisibly, until suddenly you see the results of God’s handiwork.

— Cheryl Brumbaugh-Cayford, director of News Services for the Church of the Brethren