Our wondrous vacation date had finally arrived! We had planned to leave around 6 in the morning, everyone was super excited! In fact, the kids were so excited they all went to bed early and we had no arguments about it. Tom and I hit the hay early too because we both knew that we had a long traveling day ahead of us. We decided that we wouldn’t set the alarm and would just get up whenever we awoke. No problems there, since I’ve hit that pre-menopausal state my body wakes me up early (and I mean early) every morning. This time was no exception. I woke up eyes wide open at 3 a.m.! Tom must have been excited because he heard me get up and said, “Do you want to get up and go now?”
I replied with, “Might as well, we have a long way to go.”
Our plans for our vacation included a trip to Orlando with making a stop in Warner Robbins, GA. The first leg of our journey would be about 13 hours in the van. The kids had packed DVDs, books, computer, Nintendo DS and of course snacks. They were all set to make this journey. Tom had done most of the packing of luggage the night before so all that was needed was our few belongings and we were off! We had our traditional word of prayer before we left and we all piled into the van. It was 8 degrees outside! Wow! That was cold! We opted not to take coats since we were heading south and we would be in the van, our coats would just take up more space. Good thing Kyanne and I brought small lap fleece blankets.
Our faith was tested literally within minutes of our trip. Tom had stopped at the ATM to withdraw cash for the road trip south and the machine replied with, “YOU HAVE EXCEEDED YOUR LIMIT”. My heart started to race immediately, it was 4 in the morning and the only way our card could have exceeded the limit was if someone had stolen our information. “GREAT!” my mind screamed, “headed out on vacation, reservations made, van packed, excited family and now it’s going to be ruined!” My husband remained calm and simply claimed, “The machine must be out of money, and we’ll stop at another one on our way.” Wow! I was impressed with his composure. I am sure I looked calm on the outside; however, my mind was running 100 miles per hour. I kept thinking of all the phone calls I would need to make and the worst part it was Sunday. I would have to wait a whole day before things could be resolved. I decided that if my husband could keep his composure then I surely should. I grabbed a hold of my thoughts and reminded myself, “You just had prayer about this being a safe and wonderful vacation, now just keep your FAITH that God will work this out.” So while we drove to the next bank location I said a small prayer. Instead of me freaking out about the “what ifs” I decided to rely on God for the “and then”. We arrived at the next ATM, Tom tried the transaction and the first time it was the same response, “YOU HAVE EXCEEDED YOUR LIMIT”. So he decided to try something different and “voila” our money was dispensed. We both let out a huge “WHEW!” as we looked at each other. He gathered his card and funds and we headed on our way.
What a lesson to our kids (and ourselves) about having faith, remaining calm in the situation and leaning on God to provide. This may seem trivial to some, but to those who believe understand completely what message this story brings. This lesson in our life journey brought certain scripture to my mind. In Proverbs 3:5 it states, “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding;” We definitely learned that we had put our trust in God that early Sunday morning. It is much more peaceful to talk about the “AND THEN” in our lives rather than letting our minds race to all the “WHAT IFS” that might happen.
No comments:
Post a Comment