“My lips will glorify you because your faithful love is better than life.”
Does God care for me all the time or only when I am “serving him“?
A few weeks back, Shannan and I joined a rolling caravan of gearheads on the Hot Rod Power Tour. COVID shortened our journey from the usual seven cities in seven days to five. No matter, we had a good time!
Call me crazy, but this is the tenth time we’ve made such a run, this year rolling along the back roads in our 1966 Oldsmobile cutlass convertible.
Mind you, I thought we would be driving this car back in 2017! Yes, I “slightly” underestimated the time it would take to rebuild the engine, the suspension, and re-wire the car all while downsizing, moving, and navigating the highway that is life.
I could consume terabytes of your data plan with pictures documenting the work necessary to get this car out of the garage and on the road. I’ll save you that. But here’s a sampling of this project that started in Boca Raton, before we moved the car to our home in Arkansas to “finish it up.”
Event organizers cancelled the Power Tour in 2020, and then pushed the 2021 event, normally held in June, to August. That pushed me up against the start of school, but “I had to go!”
I worked diligently over the summer to wrap up this four-year-project, but with two weeks to go, I had to get back to PA. So with a fourteen-day deadline and a pocket full of coins I turned the project over to Louie’s Hot Rod Garage hoping they could complete what I could not while Shannan and I returned to Pennsylvania to prepare for the start of a new school year.
Two weeks later we were on the road once again, driving 1100 miles (overnight) back to Arkansas to pick up the Cutlass only to drive it another 850 miles to Norwalk, Ohio and the start of the Power Tour.
What Louie’s Hot Rod Garage knocked out in two weeks was amazing! That said, when I picked up the Cutlass Friday afternoon, there were still a couple of issues to resolve. Whether we would drive the Cutlass or hightail it back to PA to pick up our Plan B car was still a game-time decision.
I wrenched into the night. Early Saturday morning, I was back at it. My “drop-dead“ decision point to roll out of the garage or head back to PA was noon . . . until I changed it to 1 o’clock, then 2 o’clock, and finally 5 o’clock.
At 4:30 PM on Saturday we made the decision to “go for it.” This was adventure mixed with uncertainty, mixed with sweet satisfaction, mixed with “what the heck am I doing!”
Will we make it?
We drove three hours that night with little mishap. Sunday morning was a different story. We still had 650 miles to go just to get to the starting line of the Power Tour and that with a suspect fuel gauge. Not knowing exactly how much fuel is in a car that consumes a lot of fuel is problematic. Consequently, we stopped often, which was no big deal until the Cutlass didn’t want to start each time we stopped.
Every fuel stop was heightened suspense.
About 1:00 p.m. on that beautifully sunlit and very hot Sunday, we pulled into a gas station. We still had four hours to go (best estimate), when once again the car did not want to start — until it did. Shannan had run into the little convenience store, so I pulled out of the queue of cars, and moved over to a parking space and TURNED OFF THE MOTOR. Not a good move! Once again, the 66 did not want to roar to life.
As I sat there coaching and pleading (and praying) this car back to life, a truck pulled up with a kind-hearted driver behind the wheel. He stopped, opened his hood, and in moments we had jumped it off.
A couple hours down the road we stopped again, and once again the car did not want to start. NO SOONER did the car not turn over, then another guy in a truck pulls up; a strapping young farmer who must have been a defensive lineman for the Green Bay Packers before he began planting corn. He had the mouth of a sailor and the kindness of Mother Theresa.
We jumped the car, he drove off . . . and then the Cutlass stalled. I mean, no sooner than than the saintly farmer disappeared. Not good! We were halfway down the gas station driveway. I couldn’t roll into traffic and there was no way I was pushing it back up the drive by myself.
No worries, because another guy (in a truck) jumped out to help. When his jump box didn’t jump the car, he and some friends pushed us back into a safe spot. Then he opened up his hood and with my jumper cables, we had it going again. We were off, arriving at a hotel later than planned, but after 800 miles we made it to the starting line and I was all smiles.
Then came Monday!
We had a great day on the power tour, but our high horsepower engine was getting a little warm in slow-moving traffic. Cars and overheating are a serious no-no. I would have to make a parking lot repair. So we stopped in at Walmart parking lot and I walked over to a local auto parts store to pick up an auxiliary fan. I came back to meet my two new best friends, Bob and Chris.
Fellow travelers on the Hot Rod Power Tour, they devoted the next three hours — working in the WalMart parking lot — to help me install the fan, not the easiest feat in light of the disassembly required to do the assembly.
You may stop reading this out of boredom or you may be reading this thinking, “Dude, you are insane!” or “Your wife is a saint!” or “You need to get more prepared before you go!” But those who understand hot rodding know “there’s always something,“ and you deal with what’s in front of you. And yes, Shannan is amazing!
I’m a college president, the president of a BIBLE COLLEGE for that matter! It is easy to think God cares about me doing that important work, but does God care about Tommy, the hot rod adventurer?
Yes, he does.
God, in his goodness and kindness, had someone there to help us at every step of the way. And that speaks volumes as to the love of God.
The good news of the gospel is that God’s favor is unmerited. It comes to us compliments of Jesus who did for us on the cross what we could never do ourselves (John 3:16).
God comes to us with grace. God saves us by his grace. And God continues to love us with his grace. His unmerited favor is for my salvation and ALL of my day-to-day living. I find his grace at the cross and at the gas station and even in the WalMart parking lot.
Yes, he loves me that much. Oh, and yes … He loves you that much too!
And we made it . . . there and back again with special thanks to my buddy Andre (pictured above), who has worked with me for countless hours; and our son Paul (pictured above), who also has years invested in this project; and Louis and Louie’s Hot Rod Garage whose expertise and hard work helped us get to the starting line and finish line! Thanks all!