My Life is a Comedy

We've all seen the movie. Often it is a romantic comedy, but sometimes it is a screwball comedy or some other form of comedy. Two people or groups, who will one day run into each other (and probably will become friends) could have met several times and then, after a series of near misses, they finally meet. This seems very formulaic, and many might say that it is completely unrealistic. Nevertheless, it COULD happen in real life, and I can now prove it.

Hold on for a seemingly abrupt subject change, but this will all go into how I am now excited to know the Mudge family!

Let me just say that I am relatively decent at math. In 5^th through 12^th grade, I won some contest each year from either the Florida Mathematics League, Mathcounts, or the Florida Association of Christian Colleges and Schools. Unfortunately, this has typecast me as a math teacher. So, I have been given the opportunity to teach math at Belhaven College, Central Florida Christian Academy, The Master's Academy, and Smith Preparatory School.

Now when I talk to people about being a math teacher, invariably I am asked if I can help them with their math needs. Then, when I tell them that I lack the necessary time to make it happen, they ask me if I can recommend someone else, as if we have a club with weekly meetings. Let me assure you that math geeks don't meet together any more than dudes with good mustaches might meet together (ie, they don't).

Now what this means is that when I took the job at Belhaven and heard about the person who had it before me, I didn't already know that person. And, oddly, I already worked at Belhaven before teaching math, and I just had missed running into the math teacher that I took over for. That math teacher was Pat Mudge.

A few years later, my family decided to start looking for a new church. It just so happens that the first week we visited the church we ended at (Faith Baptist) was the week after the last week the Mudge family attended there. They finally went back to Orlando Grace Church, where they already had roots and we had visited the week before we went to (their final week at) Faith.

When Scott Smith began recruiting me to start teaching math at Smith Prep, it was apparently because Pat Mudge was unable to do so, as she had recently passed away. At this point, I had heard a lot about this family and was curious about them.

Finally, today, I spent some time with Dennis Mudge, as we have joined Orlando Grace Church. Our discussion was easy and flowing. We have many of the same friends and many of the same knowledge bases. Yet, this was the first time we had really met. I am so excited to get to know him and his family. He told me of some things he had heard about me in his travels, and I could not believe how we had missed each other for so long.

I realize that the Comedic method of a series of near misses actually happened to us. And while meeting the family 14 years ago would have been super nice, I am just excited that God saves some of these little treats. I am now looking around at my friends to see who I might have known earlier if not for a series of near misses, and I am amazed at the rich complexity of how God works.