At 5 a.m. this morning I sat down at my computer to blog for the day. I looked at the screen and my user account had vanished overnight along with all my documents, emails, and financial information. My eyes about popped out of their sockets. My heart started to race. I protested out loud. Everything gone! Vaporized! What had happened!

As I despondently clicked keys to figure out what went wrong, nothing happened. The information was flat gone, and was nowhere to be found.

I stopped floundering and took a moment to pray for guidance.

As I struggled with having a hugely wasted day ahead of me trying to fix the disaster, God gave me a better view. An angel lighted upon my thought and reminded me that no good thing could ever be taken from me. My life was not on that hard drive. My life was spiritual and everything about it was permanently inscribed into my being. Each bit of information I needed to function in my work was stored in divine Mind and was immediately accessible. I didn’t have to go through a computer to find it.

I calmed down. I relaxed. The tension and anger inside dissolved. I felt there was a way to save my day.

Now that I was in a fit mood to listen, I told God I still needed that information on my PC! How was I to get it?

God said, “Call an expert.”

I logged into the Microsoft help center to see what I could find, but honestly, I felt like I was walking through the Library of Congress looking for a book of which I didn’t even know the title.

God said it again, “Call an expert.”

I was reminded of Mary Baker Eddy’s instruction in Science and Health,

“If students do not readily heal themselves, they should
early call an experienced Christian Scientist to aid them.”

I could struggle for a day, maybe even days and weeks, trying to figure out a solution on my own. But why should I? I had other work I needed to be doing that I was an expert in, and fixing computer problems was not one of my specialties. I shouldn’t hesitate to ask for help when it serves to preserve a greater good, I decided. My flourishing in what I do best is where I needed to focus my energies. And letting others flourish where they do best was my honoring their God-given capacities and talents.

I was obedient.

With a few clicks I found a phone number to call. At 5:15 a.m., I located an expert over the phone ready to help me immediately, and he solved all my problems. And for only $35! I was soooo grateful.

It took 70 minutes to retrieve my lost data, but as my prayer had revealed earlier, nothing had been lost. For very unusual reasons, the files had been automatically archived to a place I would have never known to look. The expert did know where to look, and retreived it all. And now, all is well.

We don’t always need to call another person when we have a problem. God is the number one expert when it comes to finding solutions, and we always have His ear and helping hand. But if The Expert tells us to call another expert for assistance, then we’d better obey. Solutions often appear much quicker that way.

I’m grateful for experts.