Several years ago I shared a short story of the less-than-glamorous side of life on the road. It was something that happened way back in the early 90’s. And you could either say it’s proof “God has a plan” or you could say “thank goodness for free will” and hard workers.
I prefer not to go with the “God has a plan” option.
Not because I don’t believe God can plan. Far from it. In fact, I think He carried out a beautiful and perfect plan when He created the universe and all living things. No, I just don’t believe He’s set up a daily to-do list for us.
But let me get back to the road story.
I was on one of those extremely long drives I used to make fairly often. And this one was from Texas almost all the way up to the Canadian border. And it was middle of the winter. So, the southern part of the drive was a piece of cake. But the overnight part in the northern section of the country was a popsicle.
I had to make a stop, for gas, around 2 a.m. When I went inside to pay, the clerk told me the temperature was about -35 degrees. And that’s fahrenheit. Not windchill, mind you. No, that was the actual temperature. No wonder it had felt like the heater wasn’t working.
So, I put a piece of cardboard in front of the radiator. And that helped the heater warm up the cab of my truck enough to feel like I might make it through the night.
But a little further up the road (and away from any town) the truck stalled out. Mind you it’s late Saturday night / early Sunday morning. And it’s basically the middle of nowhere. Minus 65 degrees windchill.
And it felt like the dark side of the moon.
So, in circumstances like that you’ve basically got two options. Relax and wait for the end to come. Or hope for somebody else crazy enough to be out on that kind of night.
I went with option two. But it didn’t look good. No cars in sight. And no headlights in the distance. Just when I started to think the world was out of good samaritans, some headlights appeared in the distance. It was almost like an angel from Heaven.
Before long, a diesel pickup pulled up, and as we rolled our windows down a nice guy said, “You’re lucky, man. I work overnights, but I don’t typically go in on Sundays. I was fillin’ in today. And you might not see another car for hours.”
I told him I totally agreed. And asked him if he could help.
He knew of a place where I could pull my truck inside and “warm it up a bit”. And he graciously towed me there and wouldn’t accept payment.
The good news was that the only problem I had was frozen water in the carb. And when the truck warmed up and melted the frozen stuff, it started right up. From that time on, I’ve always used water evaporators in my gas tank during the winter.
So, here’s the question.
Did God plan for all that to happen? And did He set it all up (did He decree it) before the foundation of the world? Or did God give us good brains and our own will so we could make our own choices?
If you say he planned it all, I hope you have some amazing evidence to back that up. Because, if you don’t, you’re gonna have to deal with how God planned for me to oppose you. And, as Spock would say, that’s…
“Most illogical.”
We can see design upon His land…
Even in an unborn baby’s hand,
And when life is not the way we planned,
Only a living God helps us understand.
(from “Our Father’s Day)
© 2010 Tony Funderburk
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