I wrote yesterday that I’m having trouble seeing the good and beauty in seemingly juxtaposed heartaches right now.

Turns out I was just impatient.

I walked into my daughters’ school today at noon to pick up my preschooler.  I usually walk by the elementary school playground so I can give a quick hug to my second grader during her lunchtime recess.

She’s been having difficulty with her seven- and eight-year-old girlfriends at school lately.  So, confession: I spy on her to see who she’s playing with.

I try to remember what I dressed her in that morning, and because the sea of navy, khaki and white uniforms, she’s hard to locate. I can’t always find her so sometimes I walk away not having hugged her.

But yesterday I found her at the right moment. She was being led away from the playground holding her forehead and crying because someone had accidentally kicked her in an over-enthusiastic leap from the swings into the wood chips.  She was surrounded by four girls, each of them gently touching her in some way.  A hand on a shoulder, someone holding her hand, another touching her arm, all acts of genuine concern.

She saw me and began to cry harder.  One of her little friends recognized me and ran up to tell me what happened.  When I finally reached her, the girls were comforting her; hugging her and promising to invite her to their birthday parties.

Hope let me hug her for a minute or two, but then retreated into the huddle of second grade girls, all offering some other form of comfort that her mother could not.

And I walked away and shook my head.

Not because I was surprised that her girls loved her. But because I was amazed at how I’d failed to trust God.

Yesterday I whined about how my own heart ached for my daughter and her seeming lack of friends who loved her.  I just want to see her accepted and drawn in.  And today, almost as if in response, God shows me in living, breathing color, how much He loves my daughter and cares for her heart. But He showed me how much He loves me by caring enough to bring to my eyes a scene alive with his grace and care.

God was late.  By a day.

But it was in His perfect timing.  His “lateness” created a need in me to trust him more.  He forced me to watch for Him with greater attentiveness and to be careful not to miss Him.

Are you watching for His grace today?