I was heading to my next appointment and running right on time. It was a short drive from my office to the appointment so I didn’t turn on the radio. As I approached the railroad tracks, the red lights began flashing and the traffic arm came down. Luckily, my meeting was just a short distance down the road so I was not concerned that I would be late. Sitting there at the train tracks waiting for the train to pass with no music to distract me, my mind began to wonder.
Suddenly I was remembering a co-worker who had been killed by a passing train. I thought about how it had been so many years since his tragic accident and yet it seemed like it was only yesterday. I was reminiscing about how he was such a huge Eric Clapton fan. He told me one day that he thought Eric Clapton was the greatest guitar player to ever live. My mood was becoming more and more somber as I thought about how my friend’s life was cut too short.
Then I began wondering if he was a person of faith. We didn’t work together very long. We actually worked on opposite shifts so I didn’t get to know him well enough to know if he had ever accepted the free salvation and grace offered by Jesus.
That’s when my mood really took a dip. Regardless of how I felt or what I thought I knew about my friend I really didn’t know much about his faith. Was he a believer? Had he accepted Christ as his personal savior? I was really getting down now. It’s not a good idea to go into a meeting in a bad or somber mood.
As a way of changing the course of my thoughts I decided to turn on the radio. That’s when an amazing thing occurred. The first song I heard was an Eric Clapton song and the first words I heard were, “Would you know my name if I saw you in Heaven.”
Immediately my mood was improved. I no longer wondered if my friend had accepted Christ. Through divine intervention I had my answer. What are the odds? Turning on the radio at just the right time to hear Eric Clapton singing that particular song and at that particular spot of the song was no coincidence. Think what you want, but I know it was God’s way of answering a question that was weighing me down.
When I see my friend in Heaven, I will know his name.