This is a little different than the regular stuff I write, but I wanted to share.
David was invited to spend a week in Cody, WY to share his testimony and meth prevention program with several different groups in the area. A couple of our dear friends said that it would be wonderful if we could make it a family trip and of course we agreed. We got permission to take our children out of school for an educational trip and started planning.
We departed on Friday, Sept. 16th after school, running a couple hours later than we planned with a 24 hour drive in front of us. Amy's law of preparedness states that she should always allow twice as much time to get ready than what she has planned and it held true this time as well. :) We left the driveway at 7:00 instead of 4:00.
All eight of us were traveling in our old Suburban. Now, you think a suburban is a large accommodating vehicle, and it is - to a point. Don't get me wrong, I love my suburban and we are blessed to have it, but that point ends somewhere around 500 miles or 8 hours after your departure.
David woke me up about 4:00am on Saturday morning telling me the car was breaking down near Kansas City, MO. Amazingly everyone stayed calm. We thought it was the fuel filter and made it to a city, St. Joseph, about 60 miles North of Kansas City. There we slept in the AutoZone parking lot until they opened. David changed the fuel filter in the parking lot. I had underestimated the value of a smart phone until then. Thankfully, a friend of our sons, Logan, who had gotten permission to take the trip with us, had a Droid. Thanks to Logan and his Droid we had directions straight from the interstate to AutoZone.
Earlier we had seen a sign that the interstate on our route that would have taken us through Iowa and Nebraska was closed. The clerk at AutoZone informed us that our best bet would be to back track to Kansas City and go through Denver instead. The Denver route was longer to begin with excluding the back tracking. That was okay, though, because the drive would be beautiful.
So, we go back to Kansas City. Somewhere between Kansas City and Topeka we have a flat tire. David changes the flat and we head to topeka to get the tire fixed. Again, it could have been much worse. Topeka is a town that David has ministered in a couple of different times and knew right where the tire shops were. Even on a Saturday, Big O Tires had our tire fixed within the hour.
By this time, we are sure the devil is trying his best to throw a wrench in our plans and prevent David from sharing his testimony in church on Sunday morning. Yet again, no one is fighting, no one is anxious. I knew we would make it on time. God is always victorious and I felt it was His will that we make it. He would not bring us that far for nothing and cover us with the amazing peace I felt.
We pull out of Topeka about 12:00pm. We had planned on being in Cody by 8:00pm and we weren't even close. At least the car was running well and everyone was happy and fed at this point.
Several hundred miles down the road the car starts cutting out again. We had to pull over periodically and let it take a break. Pulling up hills was really bad and if you have ever been to Wyoming you would know that it is just hill after hill, almost constantly climbing to a higher elevation.
Finally, at 8:00am on Sunday morning we arrive in Cody. We arrived with exactly enough time to unload the car, and for David to take a shower to make it to church without a moment to spare.
It took us 38 hours to make a 24 hour drive, but we made it. God was faithful as always. We made it with the car trouble. We made it on time. We made it in good humor. As if that all wasn't amazing enough - we made it without the kids fighting, even once, during the entire 38 hour car trip.
