Seventeen years ago I drove from Pennsylvania to California with six of my children. I cannot fathom why I so blithely took on a venture of three thousand miles as the sole driver in a car old enough to drink beer. We stopped for lunch and as kids hopped out of seat
belts I heard an suspicious "thunk". Normally I am allergic to all things mechanical, but I held my breath and looked under the van. There was something metal on the pavement such that it probably had recently been attached.
Although the steering was barely responsive, rather like those dreams when you can't get
your limbs to comply, I did manage to maneuver the van across the street to a gas station. That was a relief. Now my problems were solved, I believed.
We crammed into the waiting nook, my progeny and I which, I should mention, included a toddler with approximately 12,000 chicken pox unevenly distributed across his
small body. The mechanic looked dubious.
"Where do you want to go?" he yelled above the background noise of a gas station.
"We need to be in
California by Thursday." He let out a long exhale and ran his hand through his hair. After a few hours of us staring down his back, he announced that he was finished. In guarded words, he tried to explain.
"The steering block is held on by only a single bolt, because the other was broken off, and if the remaining bolt
fails... well... that would not be good." He looked at me wondering if I caught his drift. But I was too relieved to be able to get back on the road to worry. I threw money at him, we piled into the car, and headed west. I assessed the odds.
My youngest was seriously pocky, and had a history of febrile seizures. Our newly issued insurance cards were no doubt in the overcrowded mailbox at home. It was a toasty August day with no air conditioning, and we had miles of desert ahead of us. Of course if the steering block actually fell off we would have no need of a hospital anyway. A morgue would suffice.
Sitting in the front seat with my sunny six year old, I felt the contrast between his trust and mine. He felt safe and enjoyed the scenery. I stewed and fretted over worst-case scenarios.
Then Zachary said "Look, Mom!
A cloud!" Sure enough, out here in the barren flats of Utah was a single cloud. Curiously, it appeared to be, well, vertical, rather like a pillar I once read about. As we drove into the pillar of cloud, we found ourselves washed in rain.
"I didn't think it rained in the desert, Mom!" he exclaimed.
Zack's joy was expanding.
"You are right, it usually doesn't," I admitted. Then I saw it. A rainbow, as wide as a football field stretched just out of arm's reach.
"A rainbow!" he shouted, "I think it's a sign that we will make it!"
"I think you are right," I agreed with a growing smile.
Two days later when we finally arrived home and took the car in to our own mechanic, his eyes grew wide.
"You drove how far in this car?" he gasped. He refused to fix it, and insisted we invest in a new one. How bad does an engine have to be before a mechanic turns down a
job?
The reality is, the Lord is always taking care of us. But something happens when we walk a little closer to the edge, and feel the winds of danger whip past close enough to chill. When that veil of protection is lifted
just for an instant, I sense that He is watching me, every moment of a moment. It's funny, but I feel more loved.
Angels from the Lord lead and protect a person, and this every moment, and every moment of a
moment. (Emanuel Swedenborg, Secrets of Heaven 5992).
