God is still working miracles, even for us, the Matsons

     We took our Tiki-wagon on an impromptu trip from Salem to Crater Lake yesterday. We call it the Tiki Mobile because there is a mean looking tiki with his surf board painted on the hood. Not our choice but it came with the car and certainly attracts lots of attention. It was fairly hot yesterday and as we climbed the mountain the temp gauge reminded me the radiator is fairly well plugged and kinda hot headed. I had forgotten. We don't drive it much, only when all six of us are riding together, which seems to be increasingly rare. Then, leaving C.L. the Trans started acting up. Making noise in first gear, not shifting up some times, and not shifting down to first at stops were the most obvious. I knew there was no chance of it getting us the 230 miles from our hotel home. None. This morning we packed up car, moved it back from curb to check fluids, then did something we have never done. We held hands in the car and prayed. Prayed for protection and safety and please, please, please, hold our car together until we get home. No need for paragraph breaks in this story, right? So off we went. Got gas, drinks for everyone, quart of oil for car, and hit the road. It was never right.  Noisy in first and second, didn't want to shift to third, but once on Highway all was beautiful, like nothing was wrong at all. 3-1/2 hours freeway to our off ramp. No stops needed. 1/2 home someone had to potty. We hit up Ronald, let the kids play, and some people searched for poke stuff. Second half of journey was more of same. Hit our off ramp in Salem and made it to about two miles from home when car just stopped pushing forward. Pulled over and left car running for minute or two, hit the gas and it started moving. Little old lady in a walker might have gone faster but we were moving. Repeated this three or four times til we hit our driveway. We had probably gotten an hour into the ride when I just knew we would make it home and car would still move on its own. After the car quit moving though, I had serious doubts. This is an absolute miracle. No ifs ands or buts. Years ago I sat on a broken school bus on the highway's shoulder going home from a youth group beach trip not a mile from the other bus we broke on the way to the beach. My buddy (the youth pastor), gathered most of the 35 kids and staff in a circle to pray, and not kidding, I sat in the bus scoffing under my breath, what can God possibly do in this situation. Within minutes a 95 or so passenger bus pulled up with only 35 people on board and offered us a lift. That was the defining moment in my life to understanding that God is, well, still God. So now my car sits at home needing a radiator and Trans or Trans work and life keeps on spinning. Another time God stepped out and did something too obvious. Not a silent whisper, but two large hands clapped together and a ha!, see that? God says. See what I just did there? I love you in the quiet and I love you in the big loud audacious way that only I can.

Time for me to be committed, one way or another.

     I went to bed and curled up fetal like, I wanted to admit myself to a psychiatric place and remain in that position forever. The cause of my condition unknown in those moments. I wondered what would I feel in the morning. There was little relief with daylight. Relief would require a why. Why was I self destructing? Like a great train wreck that continues to pile car upon car was me inside. Outside completely normal.

     When I finally came to enough to realize how late it was I heard Chris tell a kid we weren't going to church. We had just gotten up to late. I needed to go to church. I needed to connect. Although I knew the chance of any real connection happening was slim, I needed to go. After getting a Coke and Haagen-Dazs on the way I managed to show up just over an hour late.

     I didn't get any miracle connection. I did talk to people for quite a while and then bumped into an old friend at Goodwill, but there is this. We have this wonderful analogy of a cup. We meet with God, He fills the cup, we pour out into others, meet with God and He refills. We repeat forever til we leave earth. I think God showed me something else cause that didn't fit the right now. Imagine a machine where something is fed in, like fabric. So there is a big hand crank and as you turn it rollers on top and bottom feed the fabric in. Now at the other end after the machine has done it's work the fabric leaves the machine. I am the machine, the fabric is what God has put in. Something on the other end has happened though. The fabric has not been allowed to come out and go to the people it is meant to be for. The handle continues to turn and feed more in but now the insides become all jammed up and it is hard to turn. Realizing this, the handle is turned the other way, but this creates further jamming as things are not meant to go this way. Now the inside of the machine, of me, is a jumbled mess. From the outside it is fine. The hum of the machine's motor continues on day after day, all appears well. Inside is, as the conductor would say, chaos and delays. (Thomas the Train reference).

     Where do things go from here? Well, probably not an asylum, maybe not anyway. Today has been something else. Complete and total freedom from every obligation my life normally holds. No worries whatsoever of the kids, no time needed to be home, no dinner or laundry or bike stuff or car repairs. No demand on me whatsoever. I do not remember another day like this. God is so good. Surely one day this will make sense. It will be relevant to another time, to another me, further down the path. For now though I've got to listen to the still small voice when He says to get involved where I have said no before. I must act. I must do something. I have an idea. Something that has been a recurring thought. I think i will finally have to step out and just do it. I think it is time to join this group, not as leader, but as just one small piece. Oh Lord be with me. Help me to move.

     I know the end of this is pretty vague, please forgive me for that. I'm a really messed up guy yet God still has work for me to do. People for me to reach. I hope you think that is cool. I'm still hurting a lot. I don't know what comes next. I don't know if everything will be better next week or if next year I'll be a disaster still. I want things to be better but really not sure if I'm ready to make the choices for things to change.

     As usual, thank you for reading. May your journey be amazing and filled with God's love. God bless.