Lesson Learned

Someone told me once that contemporary worship songs don’t teach Biblical truths like the old, traditional hymns do. But I know otherwise.

So I’m lazing in bed one Saturday morning listening to this bluesy country music on the radio, when my husband suggests I get up and go for a ride with him. You know, A Ride. On the bike. A motorcycle ride on the Harley. the HD. Umm... wait, don't I have a dentist appointment to go to? No? Sigh...

Why do I find this so frightening? Is it that I haven’t got my last will and testament in order? No, it's my active imagination that can graphically picture my body smeared across blacktop like strawberry jam on burnt toast. I confess to that fear. After hedging a bit, I agreed to go and suggested a short run to Tehachapi. That seemed relatively safe. Except that I forgot one small detail: the freeway.

Freeways are a piece of cake in a car, and everybody drives them like they own the road in California. On a bike, however, even with my ever so cautious husband driving, vulnerable does not begin to describe the feeling that gripped me that morning as we rode, screaming along at 65 M.P.H. next to 18-wheelers and cars with cavalier drivers (not as in the Chevy, but as in lacking concern for my bodily safety).

I felt exposed; completely at their mercy should any one of the drivers make a wrong move. What some people consider the thrill of speed is terror to me. I clung to the bike. Wiping wind-crusted tears and sweat from the corners of my eyes, I peered out at the brownish horizon in town. As we ascended into the golden, oak tree-dotted foothills, the brown haze cleared. Above the layer of smog on the valley floor, intense blue sky suddenly surrounded us, and directly above was the bluest of all. I looked upward… and kept looking up. Things looked clearer up in the sky, safer; no traffic to distract my thoughts.

I clung to the rumbling machine and was suddenly intensely aware of God's presence. He was right beside me, holding my hand and my heart. I imagined His massive, gentle hands manipulating the puppeteer’s strings attached to us as he raced along holding us aloft, orchestrating the show. I smiled at the mental picture of God in great white flowing robes, snowy beard aflutter, effortlessly zipping through the azure sky. And then I heard Him. No, not a voice. God speaks in lots of ways. When God brought to mind the lyrics to a contemporary worship song, “You Never Let Go”, I knew he was giving me an Instant Message. The song’s lyrics are, “Oh no, you never let go, through the calm and through the storm. Oh no, you never let go, every high and every low. Oh no, you never let go, Lord, you never let go of me!” Because of that song, I knew to cry out to God in my fear, and when I cried out in my heart, God heard and reassured me.
Sometimes I see the silliest images of God in my mind. But then again, maybe this was the perfect mental picture. God knew my need, and in His generous grace, peppered with a sense of humor, He gave me an imagined scenario that provided the way to soothe my fear. He was my peace.

Hubby set a much slower tempo for the ride home on the well worn and twisting road, meandering through the low desert. The slower pace allowed for viewing tiny, shell pink wildflowers waving by the roadside; slithering, russet color snakes; lizards whose color blended into the ash gray stones. God was there to be seen in all His creative glory, His artistry on display in the color palette of the land.

That day, on the back of a motorcycle, God soothed my fear and reassure me that He never lets me go. That’s a lesson learned, and applied.