Timing

A little less than 200 miles to get to our destination and we have a flat tire, on the front. So we aren't going anywhere for a little while. 

We make some calls and someone tells us that they will come right away. 

We have 6 1/2 hours to make our delivery today, otherwise it will hold over until tomorrow. 

So, let's think this out... The service tech will locate a tire of the right size and load it onto his truck. Then he will gather any tools he might need. Maybe he better go to the bathroom before leaving the garage. And oh yeah, better grab a cup of coffee to keep warm. It is only 7 degrees. Maybe he better run back in and grab his other gloves and another jacket, only he doesn't run. He walks, slowly, after all he's not really awake yet at 7:55 am.

Now he has to drive to the place on the turnpike where we are. 

Our truck must be jacked up, the old, very frozen, blown out tire must come off. He gets out all his tools, he gets out a piece of cardboard to kneel on. He decides to put on the second coat. He climbs up on the back of his truck to get our new, very heavy tire down and closer to our truck.

He must have said his prayers and be living right because everything went smoothly (how often does that happen?)

Our tire is off, now he removes the bad tire from the rim. It takes a sledge hammer. Can you imagine the shock of each hit on your cold arms and shoulders? The tire is off the rim. He rolls it to his truck, picks it up and tosses it onto his truck. 

The new tire is on the rim and he airs it up.

It is going onto our truck. 

I feel the jack lower us.

Now he begins to gather his tools and put them back into his truck.

Then he comes to us for payment. We give him our credit card and he has to go do our paperwork and run the credit card. 

After a while he returns for us to sign the receipt. 

We talk a moment but I see icicles in his mustache. He returns to his truck and drives away. 

We now have 4 1/2 hours to drive 200 miles and make our delivery in downtown DC, just 2 blocks from the Capitol Building. 

Ugh! We would be cutting it close. 

You see, as most of you know, my husband and I are truck drivers. We drive for FedEx but more specifically, Custom Critical. Our freight is always something very important that has a very critical time frame for delivery, think: donated organs, very needed medications, we even delivered a machine that keeps a heart alive outside a body during surgery just minutes before the scheduled surgery. The surgeon was waiting on the docks as we backed in. 

Anyway, we are always in a hurry. A big hurry! So we were chomping at the bit, so to speak.

The tire man was faster than what we thought he would be but his timing was different than ours. We were just customer #1 of his long, cold day. 

Do you understand what I'm getting at? 

All of this reminds me of 2 Peter 3:8-9. God's timing is different than ours. Sometimes we get so anticipatory that we want Him to come for us right now. We long to go home. 

But we are child # ??? In God's eyes. He wants all to long to go home with Him. So he is patient. He waits. He's not in a hurry.

But one day, that day will come. It will. 

I can hardly wait.

“But do not overlook this one fact, beloved, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance.”

2 Peter 3:8-9 ESV