Chapter One
I barely slept at all that night. I tried; even when I was dead exhausted at three in the morning, I closed my eyes and told my body that it was time to drift off to sleep. My body said okay for a moment, but then it got to thinking about the trip, about what I was going to say to my parents, about the incredible relationship we were all going to have, and it would get equal parts excited and nervous, and I’d be chasing sleep for another hour.
Just before seven in the morning, I dragged my bag of clothes out to the parking lot and loaded it into the back of the Tahoe. I had several hundred dollars of the money Jake had given me, more than enough to get to Indiana and back again. My truck hadn’t been started in a while, but it roared to life, almost expectantly, as if it was as eager for the trip as I was. Heart thudding almost through my chest, I pointed the car east on Interstate 30 and retraced the route I’d taken three weeks earlier – it couldn’t have been three weeks ago, it had been a lifetime, a thousand lifetimes – from the place that had given birth to the new me, back toward the place where I’d spent the last 23 years as the old me.
The first three hours of the trip passed in a moment, that mixture of excitement and nervousness squishing my chest as if an elephant was using me for a mattress. I made it into Arkansas, passed Little Rock, and made it almost to Memphis, turning north onto Interstate 55.
A few minutes later, a faint whopping sound grew into a loud whopping sound and the truck began to shudder. I eased it onto the shoulder, annoyed but not too angry about what I assumed was a flat tire. Cars whizzed past me on the interstate as I eased out of my door and circled around to the passenger side, checking out the rear tire, which was as flat as, well, an elephant’s mattress.
I popped the back hatch, pushing my duffel bag to the side and pulling up the panel that hid the spare tire…which wasn’t there. I frowned, scratching my head absently, until I abruptly remembered the hiking trip to Mineral Wells from way back before I had trusted God. Sure enough, I’d gotten a flat tire in the parking lot and had barely driven my truck since then. I’d never even though to get a spare.
What could I do? I had no idea how far I was from the nearest place to get a new tire, and because I had no income, I owned no cellphone. I honestly hadn’t felt the need for one so far, not living in the same building as most of the people who mattered to me. Besides, who could I call? The only people I knew in the world were seven hours from me, and even though I knew beyond any shadow of a doubt that Stanley or Danny or Abbie would drop everything to come help me, I’d still be stranded till they showed up.
I sat in the back of the truck, just pondering what to do, watching the traffic blast past a few yards from me. While I waited, I had a few choice words with God, demanding to know why something like this had happened if it was so important that I get back and talk to my parents. I didn’t understand it.
Barely had the words escaped my mind before I saw one truck lurch as it passed me, hauling on the brakes. Looking over my shoulder through the windshield, I saw the other truck stop fifty yards down the road, then begin reversing toward me. The man that got out was dressed in business attire, shirt and tie and slacks, but even so he was rolling up his sleeves like he was ready to do some work.
“What seems to be the problem with your truck?” he asked brightly.
“Just a flat tire. I’ve already got the spare on it, though, so I need to get a new tire.” I put out my hand. “Eli Radak.”
“Kevin Miles,” he said, with a quick shake. “I felt like I should stop and help you. Dunno why, really. I’ve never done this before and I don’t know the first thing about cars. But…” He knelt, examining my tire. “Huh, ain’t that something. Looks like we’ve got the same size tires.”
Only then did I notice that he was driving a GMC Yukon, identical to the Tahoe in everything except name. “That’s funny.”
“Let me give you my spare tire.”
I looked at him, wondering about God’s sense of humor. “Thanks. I’ll give you some money so you can buy a new one.”
“No, don’t worry about that. I just think it’s interesting.”
“What’s that?” I dug in the back of the car for the jack, pulling it out of its clip and moving around to the side of the truck.
“Well, you’ve got basically the only problem in the world that I could help you with. And I’ve got exactly what you need.”
“God provides,” I said, forgetting for a moment that I wasn’t talking to my friends.
“God does provide,” Kevin agreed. He watched me spin the lever, slowly raising the truck off the ground an inch at a time. “I think I needed to be reminded of that today.”
“You’re a believer?”
“Yeah. You know the weird thing? A couple days ago I was praying that he would give me some confirmation, just remind me that he’s really out there. And you better believe I was asking some serious questions when I felt like I needed to stop and help you. I just about didn’t do it.”
“That’s crazy. Like we’re each the answer to each other’s prayer.”
“It’ll give you goosebumps if you think about it too long,” Kevin agreed. “I’ll be right back with that tire.”
I wondered what God was up to. He could just as easily have gotten me to Indiana and back with no flat at all, and I would never have known the difference, but he had allowed – caused? engineered? was there really a difference? – this obstacle, not just so that I could be encouraged, but so that Kevin would have the chance to flex his faith a little bit too. It occurred to me that “God’s plan” was a whole lot bigger than I or anyone else could ever know.
It was surreal, as I sat there waiting for Kevin to walk the tire back, for me to think about all the people in the United States, and how many chance meetings God was organizing at this exact moment, uniting people who needed to sell a house with people who needed to buy, people needing encouragement with the people who had the exact right words to say, people who needed a spare tire with the guy who, somehow, miraculously, had the precise same size of tire he needed. My head spun trying to take it all in. If the storm earlier in the week had helped me understand how powerful God is, this had done the same.
And all from a lousy flat tire.
Kevin came back with the spare, which we hoisted onto the axle, Kevin tightening the lug nuts as I tossed the flat tire into the back next to my duffel bag. His hands were greasy and he had accidentally smeared a huge grease stain onto the right arm of his cobalt-blue shirt. When I pointed it out, he shrugged. “It was worth it.”
“Thanks, Kevin.” We shook hands again and climbed back in our separate trucks, to probably never see each other again.
I was thinking about God, as the miles wound past and Arkansas gave way to Missouri gave way to Illinois. Long after dark, I passed a sign welcoming me to Indiana, which only a month ago I would have been happy never to see again.
But today was different.
A few more hours in Indiana saw me pull into my parents’ house close to midnight. The living room light was on; they had stayed up for me. Maybe that was a good sign.
I pulled the Tahoe into my old corner of the driveway, pulled my duffel bag over my shoulder, and prayed hard.
New Heart Church Page 34