Costco, Contacts, and Christ

If we learned anything as a church in the last year, it’s that God is not confined to a building.

As special as services inside our beautiful church campus are, God reminded us in 2020 that He shows up in living rooms, parking lots, hospital beds, and in some of the last places we would expect.

This week He showed up for me at the Costco Optometry Department. Yes, I was surprised too.

I was fresh out of contacts and am still a 20-something who relies on my mom for her Costco card (yes, I know, you can judge me), so we planned to run and pick up some more together this week. We had agreed to go after our work day, but during the lunch hour, I felt this gnawing need to go sooner. I asked her if she’d be willing to go right then and there, and upon her confirmation, off we went.

We got our ticket and waited for our number to get called - ironically, our number was 666 (I’m going to hope that one was just a coincidence). And then God did that cool thing He always does - He showed up. In the middle of Costco, in a way I could have never expected.

It quickly became apparent that the employee who was helping us was a believer. Over the course of the next twenty minutes, she began to share about the incredibly miraculous conversion story she had, and she prophesied over us and identified things about us there was no way she could have known out of her own knowledge. We left incredibly encouraged by her faith and testimony, and the things she spoke over us through the Holy Spirit.

I’ll spare you all the details because, Lord knows, I would probably write a novel rather than a devotional. But I want to share with you one of the main things she kept affirming as she shared her story. She told us,

“Life is about love. I spent so many years, almost my whole life, depressed, angry, and unable to help anyone. Because I didn’t know love. And then God showed up and everything changed. I have a joy and love for people that is only from Him.”

And you could see it! You could see it in the passion in her voice and the tears that welled up in her eyes. Jesus showed up and changed everything. And now He was speaking through her to share that love with other people. We felt it, and we knew it could only be from Him.

I think God is challenging us to live with an expectant heart. So often we limit God to what makes sense to us.

We limit Him to our twenty minutes of quiet time in the morning, to our worship playlist, to the one hour a week we spend at church. But our God is one that will infinitely supersede our expectations if we let Him. He will show up in new places, He will show up in the mundane, He will show up in the messiness, He will show up in Costco. Are you looking for Him? Are you looking for love?

In the middle of the Sermon on the Mount, in Matthew 7, Jesus shares some thoughts on how we should pray and go to God expectantly:

Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.

Matthew 7:7-8

God doesn’t want to hide from us. He actually wants to show up in huge mighty ways - He IS showing up in huge ways. But we have to be open to seeing Him. We have to be ready to ask, to seek, and to knock. He’s not going to force His way in. But once we open the door, He will knock down every expectation we’ve ever had and do something more incredible than we could imagine.

That’s what my Costco angel encouraged me with. She reminded us to live life looking at people with Jesus’ love, and then to ASK Him to guide our conversations and interactions. And she affirmed, “If you ask, He will answer.”

This week, let’s look for the love. The love that changed a Costco employee, the love that redeems, the love that conquered death, even death on a cross. Because it’s here, it’s ready to show up for you.

And you might just be looking for some contacts, but God could have so much more in store.

Cristina Schmitter

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