I was talking with a coworker a few weeks back about the car trouble he’d had the day before. He said something that really struck me, “Nobody wakes up and goes ‘today is a good day for this to happen’ when their car doesn’t start.” There’s never a good time for nuisances and costly hiccups. Our usual response to that situation is “on today of all days”.
This morning became my “today of all days”. Sitting in the lovely gridlocked traffic of Central Florida I noticed my engine overheating and then one upping itself by billowing white smoke. Obviously, engine repair is not how I hoped to spend my morning. Yet on “today of all days” that’s what was in store for me.
As Emberly can attest to, Florida traffic and mechanical repair of any kind do not make me a very amicable person. Had I anticipated this incident I would have expected it to play out with the same grace as the father working on the boiler in A Christmas Story, spewing “a tapestry of obscenity, that as far as we know is still hanging in space over Lake Michigan.” Yet as I pulled over, called out, and started adding up the dollar signs in my head my tapestry of obscenity stopped after reaching the size of a napkin. Words that would turn my mother’s ears red were shamefully thrown into the void but the rage behind them quieted a lot faster than I thought it would.
I’m writing this on the side of that same highway, hoping to kill time while I wait for a tow. I write it reflecting on the unexpected peace that I have received this morning on today of all days. It makes me think of a song we’ve been singing in church lately called Jehovah. There’s a bridge in it that refers to the many adjectives of Jehovah and the names used to refer to Him and his role in Hebrew. I find myself being grateful on today of all days of Jehovah Shalom, be your peace. I’m grateful not that I handled this situation well (I didn’t) but that there is a Jehovah who loves me enough to be my peace and who on today of all days decided to step into my frustration and touch my heart.
Collin Willis 