Shielded

It was hard to be swept into a work week like an undercurrent stealing your footing after Ben and I had two weeks off for winter break.  By the time work was over on Monday, we wanted anything but more stress.  I had planned a simple meal on a relaxing evening with nothing to do but put our feet up after a long day.  However, as easy as French dip is to make, simple and relaxing is by no means how our night turned out!
After swinging by the grocery store, I finally walked through the door of our comfy little apartment at about 6:30 and got straight to work on our dinner.  Hoagie rolls, roast beef, butter, and au juis sauce...four simple ingredients, right?  Not this night!  I turned the oven to broil and got to working on spreading the butter on the hoagies.  However, my butter was so hard that it pulled at the bread with every swipe of my knife and tore holes in each piece.  Frustration number one. 
Once the rolls were finally ready for broiling, I realized that I had forgotten to move the rack in the oven to the top shelf.  When you broil, the rack is supposed to be at the highest level or else it doesn't work right - it'll just bake it instead.  So, as I realized frustration number two, I set the rolls down in their pan on top of the stove and pulled the rack out to move it.  The oven walls must have expanded from the heat, however, because I couldn't get the rack back in once I had pulled it out. 
In the midst of whining about the rack, Ben and I noticed a burning smell coming from the stove top.  At the same time I buttered the bread, I had put the au juis sauce in a pan on the burner.  The instructions said to simmer the sauce for ten minutes.  Okay, no problem.  Turn it on and let it go.  But, continuing in the pattern of the evening, of COURSE that's not how it went.  Five minutes into the ten-minute boiling period. there was no juice left.  Instead, we had a hot pan with a layer of crispy spices stuck to the bottom.  Tastey, huh?
At this, I lost it.  I couldn't deal with dinner any more.  How could such a simple meal become such a disaster?  I quickly reverted back to age five and threw a fit in the middle of the kitchen, Ben kindly asked if he could take over and suggested that I go do something else.  Yes, please, I'll leave the kitchen!  Gladly!  What a nightmare evening!  So, I shuffled off into the bedroom to take a few minutes to rest.
Shortly after my tantrum and it sounded like everything had calmed down in the kitchen, Ben snuck in and laid down on the bed next to me.  We were laying in silence, listening to one another breathe, when I asked if he had put the bread in the oven (I was worried it was broiling and was going to burn).  "Well, the pan exploded," he said.
"What?!?  What do you mean the pan exploded?" I asked in response.

The pyrex that we had ever so carelessly set on the top of the stove had been set on a hot burner.  When I left the kitchen, Ben went to work on shoving the rack back into the oven.  Suddenly the pyrex pan exploded no more than two feet from his face. 
It's moments like these that God is so obviously present!  By His grace alone, the glass flew in every direction except exactly where Ben was standing.  We had glass in our living room, our bathroom, our dining room, in every crevace of our kitchen, in a bag of chocolates, in our kitchenaide mixer, in our oven...everywhere except for the place he was standing.  There was even glass between where Ben's feet had been, and directly behind him in the sink.
We went out to assess the damage, and it was seriously amazing!  The glass was so hot that it burned our kitchen floors, our counters, and our carpet in the dining room.  I'm sure we'll be paying for that when the time comes to move out!  It took us an hour and half to clean everything up that night, and we still had work to do.  Even now I still find tiny pieces of glass in random places.  We didn't get to rest that night until 8:30 - two hours after we got home.  We eventually did get to sit down and watch a show and eat our French dip (we went for round two, which was a success), but I think we were both so focused on God's amazing gift of protection that evening that nothing else really mattered at that point! 
Even when we are surrounded by frustrations and annoyances and are completely exhausted like we were that night, God is ultimately in charge of the results, which can only be good.  "For we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose," (Romans 8:28).  He works in ALL things, and we are blessed by his works!