Switchback

 

There’s an old joke: how far can a dog run into the woods?  Answer: only half-way.  After half-way, he’s running out of the woods.  That happened to my dear wife in Romania in 1992.  We were traveling from Cluj to Suceava, almost to Vatra Dornei and were driving through the Carpathian Mountains.  With no rest areas, gas stations, or restaurants, we had to stop and use the toilet in the woods.  My wife and her friend Wilma were modest, so they went extra far into the woods (remember the dog in the story above).  But, unbeknown to us, the road ahead made a switchback to climb the hill behind us.  A big truck passed us, followed the switchback, and was soon behind and above us. Moments later, I heard the truck’s horn honking followed by the ladies squealing.  The further that they went up the hill into the woods, they were coming out of the woods on the other side of the switchback.  Hey, have you ever been surprised in life?  It could have been a humorous situation like Kathy and Wilma.  But it could have been a surprise diagnosis of an illness.  You may have been surprised by a divorce or by the sudden loss of a job.  It could have been a phone call from a teenage child in jail late one night.  Did you know that the dear Lord knows where you are?  He is never caught off guard by your surprises.  As a matter of fact, God uses setbacks caused by Satan to shake us up.  Paul said in I Corinthians 10:13, “There hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man: but God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the temptation also make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it.”  Hey, look for that escape hatch that the dear Lord has put there right along with the difficulty.  You are not alone.  Trust God.  He will never forsake His own!