Driving by faith

I have heard the expression “walking by faith” many times in my life. I understand it to mean that a person will continue down a path in life even though he does not know the future outcome. He takes that path by faith, knowing that God will direct his every step and in the end everything will turn out the way God planed (for the best).

This past week I had the opportunity to drive by faith. We left our home on Saturday and made for a 1,700+ km round trip journey to Mwanza Tanzania for a BIMI field conference. Along the way we encountered many mechanical problems with our van. The first incident claimed the life of a good tire and rim destroying both in a single blow as we hit a pothole and then a large rock.

The second incident came a few hours later. While driving on the spare tire down a very rough road we hit a dip in the road and the front end of the van ploughed into the gravel with a thud. This blow broke one of the stabilizer mounts and punctured the spare tire. Fortunately, we were only about 4 miles from a friend’s house and we were able to limp the car to his house.

The next day we had the stabilizer mount fixed and started on our journey. Though we were able to repair one of the tires we had no spare because the bent rim was unable to be fixed. We drove another 110 km on this rough gravel road until we reached the paved road. We were able to complete the 2nd day of driving with no problems all the way to Mwanza.

I decided that I needed to buy a new rim and 2 new tires for our treacherous journey home. I left the tire shop with two new tires on the front and a spare. I made a short 30-minute stop in town and upon returning to the car I noticed that one of the new tires was completely flat. I should have seen this as an omen of bad luck ahead but instead I swapped out the spare and returned to the store to have the new tire repaired. I was on my way in no time.

The next day we headed for home down that same rough gravel road. Along the way, I would encounter 4 more flat tires. Each time I would swap out the spare tire and make my way to the next town and have the flat repaired. Not once were we left stranded in the middle of nowhere. When we stopped at the halfway point to spend the night at our friends house I said a hearty “thank you” to God for allowing us to actually arrive.

The next morning I awoke to see that in the night yet another tire had gone flat. Apparently we picked up a nail along the way and the slow leak took several hours to flatten the tire. Again, I repaired the tires and again, we were on our way.

I am not sure when it happened but along the way we hit something that cause the linkage to break on the driver’s side of the car. And at some point we hit something that damaged the wishbone on the passenger’s side of the car. These two items help the car to drive straight down the road in a safe manner.

We had no choice but to keep going- so we did. And we made it! All the way home, we wobbled, vibrated and swayed with every dip and turn. The next day I had the major items repaired so I could make a quick run to the airport. No, I was not going to run away. I had some guests who needed to catch a flight home.

As we loaded the van with their luggage, I took one last look at the van. Would you believe that I had yet another flat tire? With all the practice from the previous 3 days and 8 tire changes, I had it changed faster than the pit-crew at the Indy 500.

We have begun our search for a reliable vehicle. It has become obvious that a small mini-van is not a safe option for my family. Pray for our search, vehicles are very expensive here.