Seeing God’s blessings in the midst of the chaos is sometimes a bit challenging. There are times you can just feel the enemy throwing curve ball after curve ball. It gets tiring to be constantly swinging. However, stepping out of that batter’s box for a moment, taking a breath, and focusing your vision on God can get you seeing God’s blessings instead of just the balls. With our focus on God and his unfailing faithfulness, we can see past the chaos that surrounds us to where He is with us.
A Week of Seeing God’s Blessings
Christmas 2021 turned into a week of curve balls. It was like one of those mechanical ball pitching machines that got turned on top speed. They just kept coming and coming with no breaks in between.
At that time we were living in Kentucky and had traveled to see family in Louisiana. Early morning Christmas Eve, our middle son calls. He sounds horrible, feels horrible, and I had to tell him “you can’t come home for Christmas.” This momma’s heart was breaking having to say those words, but we had immune compromised family members to consider. Thankfully, he did not have covid and family friends lovingly took him in for Christmas, even making sure there were presents under their tree for him to open Christmas morning. What a blessing to have friends so willing to step up in our absence to take care of our son!
Christmas Day for us was a lovely day spent with family. We feasted on delicious food, we enjoyed visiting with those we hadn’t seen in a while, and relaxed watching a little football or sleeping off that food baby. Our oldest and his family were driving in that evening and we were especially excited to spend more time with our grandson.
And then…
As we followed my father-in-law back to their house, we both hit what turned out to be a ramp in the road. Both vehicles had flat tires. My father-in-law called 911 for assistance in not getting run over on the dark highway, I called my sister-in-law for extra hands, and we got to work changing tires…in the pitch black darkness. We were thankful for tools, aired up spare tires, and cruiser lights as the cars whizzed by.
An hour after we finally made it home, our daughter-in-law calls. Their car broke down at a Love’s outside Little Rock, AR. The battery is dead, they can’t get any help from Roadside Assistance, and jumping the battery didn’t work. So we packed up, switched vehicles with my sister-in-law and by 10:30pm we were headed up to Little Rock, 3 1/5 hours away. Around 2am Sunday morning we had adults, baby, and dog settled into a hotel. What a blessing hotel vacancies and warm comfortable beds are in the wee hours of the morning!
Four hours later…
My husband and son left to work on the car. They change out the battery, the car starts, but no acceleration. So, they loaded it up on a rented car dolly, we checked out of the hotel and off we went…
…until we witness a car flying off the road, down a pasture, and into a tree. Second 911 call in two days. After turning around, my husband was able to get the man’s attention. Although very disoriented, overall he seemed to be okay. As we waited for help to arrive, we realized no one had stopped before we could get back around. No one else could see him from either direction. We had been the only ones on that section of road at the time, and if we had not seen him actually leave the road, he could have been sitting there, injured, for a very long time. While I’m not saying God caused my son’s vehicle to break down, He definitely used our situation to aid this other driver. It is an amazing blessing to realize God has used you to help someone else!
We made it back safely with car in tow and began unloading suitcases, presents, and all the travel parahernalia. The bottom falls out of the last box and all the contents crash to the ground. My daughter-in-law looks down and laughingly hollers “What have we done?!”. What a blessing to be able to laugh in the midst of trying circumstances.
Thankfully, the acceleration problem turned out to just be a fuse. My husband and I had a nice lunch date the next day while our tire was repaired and the next day we headed to Baton Rouge to pick up our new-to-us camper which would be our home in the coming months.
But wait, there’s more…
We arrived at the hotel to discover the reservation we made online didn’t actually go through. However, they did have a room available and we settled in with excited anticipation for the next day. Unfortunately, we weren’t able to leave with the camper until mid-afternoon. About 10 miles into our four hour trip home, we are pulling over for a busted tire. But wouldn’t you know, God made sure we were right where we needed to be. The only place to pull over was a large motor repair and service shop. One of the industrial mechanics came out and changed our tire for us, in the rain. God granted us safe travel the rest of the way home and we just left everything hooked up to deal with in the light of day.
We spent the remainder of our time in Louisiana visiting with family before heading out for Kentucky. To close out our trip, we woke up in the hotel the second day of traveling to snow and sleet. One final curve ball on this crazy, chaotic, blessed trip.
Opening Our Eyes to Seeing God’s Blessings
Jesus said, “I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.” (John 16:33)
God didn’t promise a Hallmark Christmas movie for our holiday trip. However, He did promise to give us peace as we navigate what life throws at us. When we are mindful of His love for us and rely on His faithfulness, our eyes become open to seeing God’s blessings in the midst of the chaos and experience the peace only He can give.
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