Thoughts from Mark "Hat" Rackley

In all the travels of the Israelites, whenever the cloud lifted from above the tabernacle, they would set out; but if the cloud did not lift, they did not set out—until the day it lifted. So the cloud of the Lord was over the tabernacle by day, and fire was in the cloud by night, in the sight of all the Israelites during all their travels.

• Exodus 40:36-38

You can see from the Scripture that God does grant travel mercies, but my trip to Tennessee for the Thanksgiving holiday was phenomenal.  By the time you read this, I should be back home, but my trip down was eerily remarkable.

There may not have been any miracles, but I count the overall trip as miraculous.  First, I had just had an IBS attack and small kidney stones 3-4 days before I left.  I still was not feeling well.  After I got in the car, the exertion of packing the car hit me.  It felt like I was about to pass another kidney stone for a little while.  I considered it the exertion plus the soreness while the urinary tract healed.  I was right, within an hour, not having even left the state of Pennsylvania, I was fine.

In fact, I felt so good that I simply did not stop for anything until I was beyond Cincinnati, Ohio.  I got gasoline and I did not stop again until I reached the eastern side of Nashville, Tennessee.  Okay, the only traffic was at the offramp from the Waterston Expressway in Louisville, Kentucky onto Interstate 65 going south.  There had been a fender bender on the Expressway and then the offramp was backed up.

But on three occasions, the traffic in the opposite direction was stopped.  The highway entering Louisville was backed up for over ten miles, not moving at all.  I have been in prayer ever since.  Do I want to try a different route home, one that is normally an hour longer than the usual route?  But, if those stoppages were not freakish accidents, it might be worth the different scenery.

I stopped at my favorite used bookstore.  I sold two boxes of books and one box of DVDs, and got sixty dollars worth of books in return, a full box, paying less than ten dollars more than my store credit.

And I still got to the hotel in a comfortable time.  I was at my son’s house before lunchtime the next day, having already done my bookstore shopping.

But I heard a weird vibration in the car.  This caused me to look at the tire pressure.  I felt no vibration.  I just heard it.  Yet, one tire was a few psi (pounds per square inch pressure) less than the others.  This caused me to frequently check the pressure.  After adding nitrogen to the tire, I confirmed a slow leak.  The tire was under warranty, but the store had no room.  But somehow, my son knew a shade tree mechanic.  It seems a friend of his was looking for a new rental home, and the mechanic had the best deal.  The mechanic hardly charged anything, a good deed to be neighborly.  When I pulled into his “shop”, the Phillips head screw was visible, no need to carefully look for the leak.  It was also where it was easily fixed.

So, I could have had disaster, but it was easily fixed.  My son met a mechanic in the middle of nowhere and hardly charged anything.  I could have been stopped in traffic for hours, but I was going in the opposite direction.  I could have had debilitating pain from the aftermath of IBS and kidney stones at the same time, but the pain faded away.

None of that was exceptionally miracle worthy, but in the whole, as I look at the ways God helps me each day, the trip was miraculous.

And the return trip was almost as good. I nearly stopped once due to construction delays. As I told a friend, it was as if a hundred angels were moving the traffic out of the way. There was traffic, but it flowed comfortably, and when it slowed down, it was usually due to a speed trap, not that I drive much over the speed limit anyway – I just might accelerate to pass a truck, and there were quite a few trucks, getting things delivered before the next holiday.

Soli Deo Gloria.  Only to God be the Glory.