I was helping my son recover a deer he had taken on a bow hunting trip on Saturday night. Once we located the animal and loaded it into my heavy-duty sled, we began dragging it through the woods. Suddenly, my warm hunting clothes made me sweat profusely. The farther we went, the wetter my head got.

At one point on this journey, I stumbled over a fallen tree. A few minutes later, it dawned on me: my glasses are missing. They had apparently fallen off my head from all the moisture when I fell. My family and I tried to find them and could not locate anything in the dark.

My concern turned to panic as I knew I had to preach in less than 12 hours and couldn’t read without my glasses. My wife then commented, “If you could use your old ones tomorrow to get by, we could then order some online from Zenni Optical.”

As the words rolled off her tongue, my eyes lit up, and I remembered that 11 months ago, for the first time ever, I had ordered glasses from Zenni that I had completely forgotten about. Actually, they were bought to wear while hunting, and I kept forgetting them. They had been lying in a drawer in my bedroom for almost 6 months, and I had not touched them.

We went home. I grabbed my glasses out of the drawer and was able to preach and keep working until my eye appointment next month.

It never ceases to amaze me how God provides for all our needs. On a whim, and with a coupon, I placed an order 11 months ago and then forgot about it. At just the right moment, I was able to keep doing the Lord’s work without any setbacks. God knew my foolishness in advance and already had a plan for it.

Sometimes our apparent setbacks are merely an opportunity for God to show us his provision.