Welcome Katrina! Follow these signs! Two miles ahead!"
Katrina couldn't believe her eyes!
There was a sign on the freeway that read, "Welcome Katrina! Follow these signs two miles ahead!" With excitement she continued to drive, finding another sign, "Turn right here!" As she drove the last two miles to a church she had never been to and a church family she had never met, she was overcome with the love she already felt. During that two miles there was a series of hand-made signs, giving her directions and welcoming her by name!
Katrina had called the church the previous evening, letting them know she was a newly baptized member who was being transferred across the country. She simply asked for directions to church for Sabbath.
God worked through the lay person who answered the phone! Wanting to make sure their "new member" in town found the church, he made and put along the highway a series of personalized signs directing Katrina and welcoming her. He didn't know the reason she was moving. He didn't know she was feeling alone and needed emotional support from a church family right then.
Katrina was an airline employee. She was introduced to the Sabbath by evangelist Henry Feyerabend. Even before her baptism, she followed her new convictions and began keeping the Sabbath, changing shifts with coworkers to get Saturdays free. Then the situation changed and she was no longer able to get Sabbaths off. Katrina went ahead with her baptism anyway, full of faith that God would do something with her job situation so that she could honor Him. She was soon transferred to another state where she received full Sabbath privileges!
She smiled as she drove into the church driveway her first Sabbath in that strange town. The last sign in the series read, "Welcome Katrina!"
"It was an affirmation from God," Katrina reflects, "that this move to keep the Sabbath was the right thing to do."
When she walked through the doors of the church that morning, she found a new family waiting who showered her with love.
Gloria Bentzinger is assistent editor of the Adventist Evangelistic Association's Update. Gloria and her husband work as an evangelistic team for the North American Division This story is reprinted from Update, winter, 1994.
