Divine Encounter

Re my previous blog, I stumbled onto a brand called The Singapore Shawl. Did I mention that I ended up passing my business card to the founder of The Singapore Shawl Pte Ltd? She is a dynamic lady, and was excited on learning that I was a marketer, and a web marketer at that. She needed someone to promote her brand internationally. While I was awed by her stunning and creative shawls, I didn't have the capital, nor immediate plans to quit my job to open an office for her in NY. My current boss has been an amazing leader and I am in a debt of duty to help her marketing plans find their legs in AP before moving on.

What i DID have though, is the contact of a friend whose daughter is studying in Julliard's school of music. Actually, she's the sister of a friend I've known since I was 10. Anyway, this friend of mine staying in NY was there because her daughter is extremely talented on the piano, and is the first Singaporean to win a scholarship to NY's Julliard School of music at the age of 5.Being the marketer I am, I thought it would be an ingenuous idea to have a Singaporean prodigy in NY promoting the Singapore Shawl by wearing them at her concerts. At the same time, my friend - the mother of the prodigy - could find something else to do that could not only fill her days with something more meaningful than ferrying her kids around - she could very well make a very decent income to offset her costs of living in NY as well as the studies of her younger child whom she had brought there as well.

Well, as my friend was in NY, I went to meet up with this dynamic entrepreneur with her sister who is my childhood friend. I have known this childhood friend since I was 12. She started working for a church almost immediately after graduation. Today she is a youth pastor looking after the girls' brigade ministry. After 10 years of dealing with church leaders, and given an unhappy incident in her current church, she has decided that it is time that she moved to working in the commercial world.

However, having no skills whatsoever apart from counselling, she was stumped trying to work out which industry she could go into, and which skills she had that would made her employable in the commercial world. Today, this meeting with the founder of Singapore Shawls presented an unbelievably opportunity as if God had personally delivered the apple to her on a silver platter. She could work with her sister in New York in promoting the shawls, an accessory she has always loved.

As if this opportunity was not perfect enough, it was discovered that the founder of Singapore Shawls was a Christian who loved the Lord with all her heart, and was very much into community work. A warm, open hearted lady before her time, whom God has blessed with a wonderful gift and passion for designing shawls, we wondered at the wonderful way the hand of God had brought about our meeting and ended in a sincere prayer for partnership, and that God would bless her business and plans for the future.

I am happy for my friend. Working in a church with leaders who were conservative and at times stiff necked, she was in need of inspiration and encouragement. And this lady had inspired and encouraged her tremendously. As she was speaking I could see my friend's eyes going red, and that her anxiety of being trapped in a situation of limited options suddenly open out into a wonderful world of new opportunity, doing something that she already loved.

After the meeting, she gave me a sincere note of thanks, and I was touched that God would use me to bless this friend that was so dear to me. The feeling was indescribable - being the instrument of bringing hope to someone who was in despair and feeling trapped. It is a wonderful feeling when you realise God has given you the keys with which you have used to free someone from their personal prison. And I am immeasurably grateful that He would use someone as self-centred, wayward, and unfocused as me. I can only hope that there would be more of such opportunities coming my way.