Cast your cares...

If on a Sunday morning after worship,
A service full of praise and song and teaching and the beauty of His church,
You have stopped for a cup of coffee before starting the last leg of a trip.
And you get back into the car and turn on the I-pod for some tunes through the car speakers,
And on the last verse of All Creatures of Our God and King, you have to sing the Alleluias by yourself because the I-pod stops working.

And then you exit the interstate to a state road,
And then the lights on the dashboard start blinking randomly,

And then the car shuts down,

And then you can’t even start it, not even turn the engine over.

And you realize that this car is not going even one rotation of the wheels farther.

And you take a deep breath and pull out your AAA card,

And you utter a prayer of thanksgiving that, supernaturally and beyond logic, you were prompted to renew that membership last month,

And you call and try and figure out enough to describe where in this state you are.

And you stand by the side of the road and wait for a tow truck,

And say “no thanks, help is on the way” to the nice young couple that stopped to ask.

And you pray again for His good provision and sovereignty and timing to work all this out.

And you believe that He will, but you sure can’t see what that will look like.

And you watch your car pulled up on a flatbed tow truck,

And you climb up in the front seat of the rig and smell diesel and wonder “how much is this going to cost,”

And “Man, are we even going to make it there?”

And you pull into the Sears shop where they think they can fix it and get you back on the road,

And you get the estimate of how much it will cost,

And how long it will take.

And you wander around the nearly empty mall.

And you wander across the parking lot for a burger and shake,
And you wait.
And you phone family,

And you wait.

And you phone friends,

And you wait.

And the part that is supposed to be the fix breaks,

And you wait.

And they finally finish,

And you pay the bill and get back on the road in a downpour.

If all that happens, six hours later, you stop and pray again,

And thank God for His good provision and sovereignty and timing to work it all out.

And you make it to where you need to be,
Tired, hungry, and late, but you do arrive where you need to be.
If all that happens,

Then you can be thankful for the sermon message of that worship service, in what seemed like days but really was only hours before-

Cast all your cares upon Him, because He cares for you…

And after you have suffered for a little while, the God of all grace, who called you to His eternal glory in Christ, will Himself perfect, confirm, strengthen and establish you.

To Him be dominion forever and ever.
Amen.
1 Peter 5:7, 10-11