The Flat Tires of Life

As a young single, living in the world today, my world and thoughts are often consumed with the “what-ifs” of life, such as what if I sleep through work, my cell phone isn’t charged and no one is here to wake me up? What if I wake up in the middle of the night and there is a roach on the wall? Or what if I never get married? And the most important, what if my tire goes flat, and I don’t know how to change it? No matter how many times I have wondered what would happen if this were to occur, how if I got a flat tire while driving down a lonely freeway I would just drive on the rim for miles and miles until I come to a gas station (I’ve seen it happen during car chases and it worked for them) because as a single woman we always need a plan, right?
One day after being at work sixteen hours, and being awake for over twenty-four hours I was in a rush to get home so that I could take a nap, get my carpets cleaned, a couch delivered and get ready to come back to work. At that moment, I was deliriously counting down the minutes until I could climb into bed and enjoy some moments of desperately needed sleep. As I walked into the parking garage and racked my brain to remember where my car had been parked, I finally remembered. As I neared my car, I cheerfully greeted the person pulling into the parking space next to me, I jumped into my driver’s seat, turned on the engine, and then the man that I just cheerfully had said hello to, now was tapping on my window. And at that moment, I knew that this day that I had dreaded for so long was now here, I had a flat tire. Ironically, however, none of my pre-dreamt scenarios seemed to fit the one I was in because I wasn’t on a lonely freeway, or in the middle of the downtown Fort Worth ghetto. I was instead in a covered area, with three kind people almost instantly willing to help me with this plight I had found myself in. In no time, what could have been a catastrophe was soon fixed. I had a fix-a-flat in my car, another of the guys had an air pump in his car, there was a place across the street that could put my spare on, and I made it to a tire place shortly after that was able to fix the tire. And in less than an hour and a half I was in my bed catching some zzzz’s.
Unlike the health and wealth prosperity gospel that so many Christians today are deceived by, we as Christians do face trials and difficulties in life no matter how strong our faith is. In fact, it seems when our faith is where it should be is when these trials seem to come our way in order to test our faith. We as Christians do get sick, we have financial struggles, our houses flood, we lose our jobs, we get cancer and have heart attacks, and… we do get flat tires. Because the promises in the bible are not that we won’t have difficulty, but that during the difficult times God will carry us through. One of the first verses that many of us learn as young children is Psalm 23. David writes in verse four, “Even though I was through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me, your rod and your staff, they comfort me.” And the life of Joseph and Job of how God used difficult circumstances to bring Him glory. I could never have imagined or dreamt that it would have happened just how it did, so why did I spend so many useless minutes dreaming up plans on how to rescue myself, or worrying and fearing over something I did not know if or how it would happen. I should have instead spent my energy trusting in the one who not only always is there for me, but also doesn’t have to dream how it will happen, why? Because He already knows!!