The Vacuuming of a Sacrament Cup

This morning, I got myself into what could have been a good deal of trouble, but some prayer got me out of it again.

I was vacuuming in the chapel, and a small, plastic, Sacrament cup got stuck in the vacuum's hose. Normally, when vacuuming in the chapel, I use a larger vacuum whose larger hose can handle Sacrament cups without any issue. However, that vacuum is also heavy, and I was vacuuming up in the Sacrament Prep room, at the back of the choir seating. I didn't want to haul the larger, heavier vacuum up there, so I used one of the smaller, normal-sized vacuums instead, only to realize, an instant too late, that the smaller vacuums' smaller hoses aren't large enough to handle Sacrament cups.

The cup became stuck in the vacuum's hose. I had no way to reach it to pull it out, and I had nothing I could use to push it through. It was stuck beyond any means I could think of to get it out.

So I prayed.

Actually, I prayed as soon as I realized there was a problem and couldn't immediately think of a way to solve it. I then tried everything I could think of, to no avail.

Eventually, I had a thought that had to have been inspired. I realized that, even though I couldn't push or pull the cup out with any tool or technique at my disposal, I could still, theoretically, suck it out with the larger vacuum, so I hooked the vacuums up to each other, removed the filter from the smaller vacuum so its hose would have as little obstruction as possible, and turned on the larger, stronger vacuum. I instantly heard the cup shoot out of the smaller vacuum's hose and down the hose of the larger vacuum. The problem was solved.

And, gratefully, I prayed again, thanking God for leading me to the solution to my problem.

There is at least one analogy I can pull out of those two vacuums, and the moral is that when we face problems that are too big for us to handle, we should connect to God and trust Him to take care of the situation. Of course, God usually helps us only after we've done what we can do and it doesn't work, and His solutions still usually involve some further effort on our part, but when our limited abilities are connected to His greater wisdom, we can accomplish much more than we could have accomplished alone.

I had no way to get that Sacrament cup out of that vacuum. If I hadn't been inspired with the solution to my problem, I would have had to admit that I had made a serious mistake and that someone much more qualified then me was going to have to fix my mistake for me. But as it turns out, that kind of happened anyway. I confessed my mistake to God, and He, being much more qualified than I am, suggested a solution. And here I am now, admitting my mistake to all the world (or rather, to the dozen-ish people who read this blog).

But the thing is, there's no shame in going to God, admitting we've made mistakes, and asking for His help in solving them. He already knows what happened and how foolish we were, and He's not usually terribly judgy about it, especially when we come, not offering excuses, but humbly seeking help.

In hindsight, I'm glad I accidentally made that big of a mistake this morning, but that's mostly because I'm glad that I learned some valuable lessons from that mistake and that God graciously bailed me out of it.