Midnight Tire Trouble

It was a typical late night stop. We had just crossed the Oklahoma state line and there was nothing around except one gas station. Stephen bought some gas and Dad bought some coffee. It was after midnight. Dad walked around the trailer to make sure the tires were okay because the roads had been very bumpy and we had just blown out a trailer tire a week ago. It was good he checked because one of the tires was missing! Because we have a duel axle trailer with four tires we hadn’t noticed as we were driving. The rim was still there, of course, but the tire had completely disintegrated except for a tiny bit of rubber around the rim.

Dad and Stephen knew we didn’t have the right jack with us. So before attempting to use our two van jacks, Dad decided to see if the gas station had a floor jack. He noticed two employees standing outside smoking and he asked them if they knew where we could find a jack for our trailer.

“Oh, we’ll fix the tire for you,” they said, “we work at the tire shop across the street. It’s closed but we’ll open it up.”

Tire shop across the street?! Dad thought…

Yes. Amazingly, we just “happened” to stop at a Love’s gas station with a connected truck tire shop and the tire technicians were still there. It was a good thing, too, because the rubber was wrapped around the axle and it would have been difficult for Stephen and my dad to fix it without better tools. There are only a few Love’s stations with tire shops and this one had opened only three days before. We were thankful for the way God had taken care of us.

I had been asleep, but I woke up in time to get out of the van and document the event. 🙂 The mechanics were friendly, had the tire fixed in about 15 minutes, and charged a very low price.

I prayed for a chance to witness to these mechanics because I know that God allows these things to happen for a reason. While dad walked with one of them back to the gas station to pay, I handed the other one a “10 Commandments Coin”. (I like these coins because they are great conversation starters.) Apparently he was a Baptist pastor’s son but “didn’t have very much time for church anymore.”

“So what is in your trailer and what are you guys doing?” he asked me.

“We are on our way to a home school conference in Oklahoma,” I told him, “In our trailer we have some resources for families including some books about Creation Science. Science and the Bible don’t contradict each other – in fact, science is consistent with Genesis.”

He raised his eyebrows and seemed interested.

“Most people don’t hear this because schools today teach evolution,” I continued. “Schools claim to be ‘neutral’ about religion, but they are actually ‘anti-god’ in what they teach because evolution is in essence an ‘anti-god religion’.

He agreed with me, and seemed to find what I was saying very interesting.

I thanked him for his help with our tire and told him that their help was pretty much a miracle for us. I told him about how the Lord had provided in similar ways recently and we were grateful to the Lord for taking care of us.

My dad came back about this time with the other mechanic. We left them both with a Making Brothers and Sisters Best Friends book, and prayed that the Lord would continue to work in their lives.