God Blows My Mind

God,
The human heart is not designed to hold this much joy. (Oh wait, I'm telling YOU about how humans are designed. OOPS!)

When I was rolling along the river today thinking about how to finance the repairs on my Explorer, were you sitting up there on your throne, shivering with delighted anticipation, knowing what you had orchestrated and how you were about to BLOW. MY. MIND!!!!

Two nice, middle-aged men in a mini-van pulled up beside me and I recognized them from the trail earlier in the week. As we began exchanging pleasantries, they got around to asking if I attended church. Long story short, the driver was the preacher at a small, country, Baptist church. (Usually, the words "small, country, and Baptist" strung together give me hives. I haven't had great experiences with fundamentalist Christians. But these two men... absolute loves. One owned a used car lot. Oh my! I hadn't thought of this... probably the two professions I least trust!)

Long story short... they drove back to the parking lot, examined my Explorer, drove back to where I was still rolling on the trail, and told me that they had a friend/"brother" who would fix my vehicle and only charge me for parts.

I'm praying about how to fix my car. Five minutes later, it's taken care of. And I didn't do one thing to orchestrate it. JUST.PURE. GRACE!!!! AND, I made two new friends, who challenge me to be more careful about the judgements I assign to people.

As if that isn't enough, I rolled past the huge red bus that has been parked at the river for the past few days. I had noticed an African American driver just sitting there for days. Today, the bus door was open.

"Hi there! You've spent a lot of time here recently!"
"I'm from Detroit and driving a busload of college rowers who come here to train. I love this river, it is so peaceful."

We entered a deep conversation about disability, his rheumatoid arthritis, how God had used that to reform his checkered past, and then he said something that Blew.My.Mind: "Curses are sometimes blessings. and Blessings are sometimes Curses."

It was like talking to a mirror of my own journey. How many hundreds of times have I uttered those very words. He told me that he had been watching me and admiring my gumption.

Now, I'm up to three new friends. Baptist Preacher, Used Car Salesman, and (formerly scary, black man from the hood) Bus Driver.

A little way down the trail, I met Dana and her rescue dog, Hogan, and had another lovely conversation.

As I loaded my wheelchair to head home, I felt like I had spent the morning on Holy Ground, sanctuary, church, community. An outdoor cathedral of the Kingdom.

And now I'm home and ready to eat a PBJ sandwich and grab a nap! Exhausted by all the GRACE!