At the collision shop

Last week the collision shop called to say my car was ready.  I thought, “Yippee!”  We’d been hoping and waiting for the car to be repaired, ever since that sad day when I hit the deer.  So Monday I picked up the car, but less than a mile down the road, the red airbag light suddenly shone on the dashboard.  “Oh, man!”  The mechanics had worked most all of last week to solve that very problem.  It’s a crucial safety issue, so I made a u-turn back to the collision shop.  They ordered a different seat belt part this time.  Tuesday morning I picked up the car again and drove home without any glitches.  Wednesday morning that red airbag light re-appeared.  I took a deep breath and drove back to the collision shop.  The estimator and manager both apologized, and the mechanics hopped right to task.  Taking a chair in the lobby, I decided I might as well clean out my big bag of a purse.  But amongst all the gum wrappers and scraps of paper at the bottom of my bag, something unexpected happened.  With the week's car frustrations bubbling to the surface, I prayed, “Lord, may you reveal the true problem with this car.  Whatever might have been hidden or overlooked, may You reveal the cause of the problem to these mechanics.”  Humbled quickly, I realized how the Lord had changed my thought pattern.  And when the estimator came to tell me the car was ready, I thanked him and smiled and explained about my prayer.  He responded only to shrug his shoulders and crumple his lips.  He explained about the seat belt, and I pondered what my reaction would have been if I were in his shoes.  Maybe the idea of prayer was new for him.  Maybe he thought prayer didn’t belong in a collision shop.  Whatever the reason, the Lord gave such pleasure to me in offering these quick words about prayer.  Since then, I've remembered something else that happened the first time I picked up the car.  I noticed a Bible sitting on the back seat, and I recognized it as the one usually underneath our driver’s seat.  One of the mechanics must have put it there.  I wondered how the Lord might have blessed the one who found it.  I wondered too if the Lord might have even connected the discovery of the Bible with the prayer He prompted in me in the lobby.  And I stand humbled on many occasions to realize how intricate and far-reaching are the Lord’s ways.  Proverbs 3:5 says, “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding.”  That “yippee” I exclaimed earlier in the week really did apply, yet now it held deeper meaning, for all this time spent at the collision shop had been for more than just car repair.

For nail-biters & hair-twirlers

Do you have any fingernail-biters in your house?  Any hair-twirlers?  You know anybody who opens a bag of chips at the slightest hint of stress?  This week the Lord gave me new perspective on nervousness.  It seems our hands tend to toil when we’re uneasy.  We start to fidget.  We make ourselves busy to mask the tension.  Yet there’s remedy in simply separating the hands.  Those schoolteachers who tell their students to sit on their hands aren’t altogether wrong.  And hence the posture of prayer and worship.  When I’m prostrate, my hands don’t touch.  Hands cannot twist and twirl hair.  Hands can’t pop knuckles either.  When hands raise in worship of the Lord, hands are apart.  Thumbs can’t twiddle themselves into knots.  Hands can’t open the pantry door to search out the Oreos.  To find rest is to finally quit stirring.  To find rest is to quit biting fingernails, quit trying to fix everything on our own, and quit avoiding being still with the Lord.  With hands apart, we eliminate some of those worrisome energy-wasters.  And I thank the Lord for teaching this week with simple pictures.

FM 3009

“Did that really just happen?  That animal’s body was BIG, with a whole rack of antlers!  Where did he come from?”  It took me a minute to realize I had hit him.  FM 3009 is a dark road that fells lots of deer, and at 5:30 AM, this buck suddenly stood square in front of me.  Abruptly he was there, and abruptly he wasn’t.  And a deluge of thoughts flooded my head.  (1) Do I continue driving or stop?  For several reasons, I opted to continue.  (2) I was sad for the deer.  (3) I was amazed at how the Lord protected me.  For the next couple of days, in almost disbelief, I kept staring at the clump of deer hair stuck at the crumpled part of the car hood.  Friends told me stories of how the collision could’ve caused severe injury if the deer had slid into the windshield or punctured the side window, yet in actuality he didn’t.  The Lord had guided me into prayer the night before and even in the moments immediately prior to the deer, and I felt keenly aware of the Lord with me.  I pondered the idea of how death for one could connect to any kind of wondrous experience for another, but then I thought of how God’s sacrifice of Jesus brought new and wondrous life for us.  The way the Lord brings good out of bad is a mystery, really.  And now each day that I put the key in my rent car while the collision shop repairs my Honda, I consider again the vast mysteries of the Lord.  I consider the greatness of His power and the depth of His love.  The mystery of godliness is great (1 Timothy 3:16).