Lucky Draw Surprise

With the festive season setting in there has been a lot of hustle and bustle in the shopping malls. People buying clothes, accessories, electronic goods, mobile phones and just about everything these days. Shopping malls are flooded with people taking the benefit of the various offers and discounts that they offer during the festival season.

Last week my wife and I were a part of a large number of people who decided to go for shopping on a Saturday afternoon. Being a weekend, the day had a lazy start. We had some grocery shopping to be done and went to a newly opened mall in the town. And as is common of every mall during the festive season, this mall too had offers and discounts and luck draw for its shoppers.

My wife who is an enthusiastic shopper quickly spotted the luck draw counter and got the details that said, if the total shopping bill amount is more than Rs. 500 the shopper is entitles to one luck draw coupon. The prices included a Yamaha Bike, a Moped Scooter and LCD Plasma Television.

So hoping to make a total bill amount of at least Rs. 500 we set out on our shopping spree. Three and a half hours later, holding a bill with a total amount of Rs. 5000 (yes.. Five Thousand) we proudly marched towards the lucky draw counter to get our coupons. Well, we weren’t the only ones. There must have been almost a dozen people lined up to get their luck draw coupons, each holding a bill of a minimum R. 500 and some as high as Rs. 30000. Thank fully I was holding a modest bill.

When we reached the counter the pretty lady smiled at us and said that we can have three tickets instead of just one, because the bill amount was Rs. 5000. That made us even more excited. It meant that we had a better chance of winning the draw. So we filled in the tickets on each of our names and the third one on my son’s name. We dropped the tickets in the box and hoping to win something we went home.

I have done this a number of times earlier and till yesterday have never won any luck draw or anything like this. Even when we play Bingo with friends I end up winning nothing at all. So when we filled the coupons and dropped them in the box, I really didn’t expect much. I was just happy with the shopping I had done that day.

It had been two days since we had tried our luck and I had almost forgotten about the whole thing when my phone rang at about 5:00pm. There was a lady at the other end asking for me. I was a little excited to know who she was. She told me that she was a representative from the mall that we had gone shopping a couple of days before and where we had tried our luck at the luck draw. To my great surprise she congratulated me and told me that one of the three coupons that we had dropped in the box had been selected in the luck draw and we had won a prize! For a moment I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. It isn’t every day that you get to hear a sweet voice saying “Congratulations you have won the luck draw!” I confirmed with her to make sure that I had indeed won.

My wife and I quickly got ready and ran to the mall to find out what we had won. I think people looking at us could easily make out that we had won something; especially my wife. She was so happy that she didn’t even want to know what we had won. Just the fact that we had won the luck draw was enough for her. But her happiness and excitement was short lived... we had not won the Yamaha bike, no we didn’t even win the Moped Scooter, but yes we had finally won the LCD Plasma Television (a real BIG plasma TV), my wife was more than happy and excited to have won a LCD Television because it was one of her most wanted items in the list that she make at the beginning of every year. And now finally before even the year is over, she has one.

I believe God has plans for all of us. He provides us with every small and big thing that we need at the appropriate time. It’s up to us to trust in Him and wait for His time. In His time he will provide.

Thanks be to Jesus who provided us with all the luxuries of life.