Awhile back, Chris and I traveled to Knoxville to attend a friend’s wedding. Normally, when we’re getting ready for a trip, things get a little tense. The anxiety of planning, packing, and getting on the road within the right time-frame so as to miss Atlanta rush-hour traffic is usually something I am dreading and thus stress over. However, this particular morning was different — and it was all because of grace.
Chris and I had decided to “accept our fate”… or maybe it was just that we handled the situation like actual adults. We faced the fact that things wouldn’t be perfect (since they never are). Ironically, because we didn’t fret over the details, there was no stress, no rushing, no craziness that morning.
Despite the fact that it was the day after Thanksgiving, we hit no traffic. We had a pleasant, peaceful drive. We listened to our Harry Potter audio book and a few podcasts while drinking our mixture of coffee and hot chocolate. We made jokes, poked fun at one another as only spouses can do, and voiced our excitement about the upcoming weekend.
Then, out of nowhere (and I do mean nowhere as no vehicles were even in front of us), a pebble popped up off the pavement. It bounced and flew against our windshield, leaving a nice little crack. We both went silent… our car is new… money is tight…we had just had a wonderful morning… and bam! We were literally hit with spiritual warfare. I couldn’t help but be somewhat amused by the irony…
I could see what Satan was trying to accomplish in that moment. Chris and I had not fallen for his temptations to panic and stress earlier in the day like we usually do. We had relied heavily on grace. Satan was mad… mad we weren’t falling, and mad that we were having a pleasant experience as husband and wife. We were growing stronger as a couple. He thought he could ruin it with merely a pebble.
And you know, he almost did. He almost succeeded. In that brief moment of silence, as Chris and I stared at the crack on the windshield in disbelief, we were faced with the opportunity to decide between letting it ruin our experience, or seeing it for what it actually was.
There was a small part of me that found it funny, that Satan thought that tiny pebble was a match for God’s grace that had already saturated our day. Even though we are not thrilled about paying for the repairs, we aren’t worried about it. We’re smart, self-reliant, and disciplined (well, Chris is…). Besides that, God is on our side.
That tiny crack was a great analogy for the both of us. Within our lives, we both have a tendency to focus on what goes wrong, just as our eyes were focused on the damaged part of the windshield. But the rest of the windshield and the rest of the car was working properly, which is usually the case within our day to day realities as well. Though so many things go right, it’s the upsets that stick to the forefront of our minds.
Chris and I decided to let it go. We swapped our inclination to be upset for God’s grace.
It hasn’t bothered us since…
Have you ever had something like this happen to you? When it was just blatant spiritual warfare? What bits of wisdom did you pull from that experience?
Original blog used with permission can be found here:
https://graceswap.com/2018/02/02/upset/