This summer my family moved from our old home to a new home closer to our church. As usually happens, not everything got taken along. So, it was, that our tractor was left behind while we took the other, more important household items like the toys, books, and furniture with us.
After we had moved into our new home and taken a week or two to get settled in, we began thinking about how to get the tractor from our old home to our new one. We decided that it would be best to have me drive it home one afternoon after I was done with my work for the day.
Thus, one warm, sunny day in August, I found myself putt-ing along on our small, Ford 8N tractor, enjoying the wind blowing in my face. The sky was clear and blue, and the birds were cheerily singing alongside the road. What a beautiful day it was! How thankful I was that I could be alive on a day like this and not cooped up at home, hurt or sick. I was even more thankful that, here in our country, we are free to worship God and to read His Word, unlike so many other children overseas.
By this time, I had been driving for a while, and had reached an area where the road became very hilly. Up and down, up and down, and up again, the hills continued on one after the other, seemingly without end. With all these hills I had to shift the gears very often. This is where I ran into a big, big problem.
I was not being as careful as I should have been. Coming up one very steep hill, I didn’t shift to a lower gear soon enough. As the tractor started losing power, it began to shudder. In my haste to find a lower gear, I missed and the gears made a terrible grinding sound. Then the tractor stopped.
Now, before I go on with the story, there are several things you should know about the little old tractor I was driving.
First of all, it was old and, although we had taken good care of it, its brakes did not work as well as they should have, and they slipped easily.
Secondly, the battery was dead, which meant that by itself, the tractor could not start.
So, there I sat on a steep hill, with almost no brakes, and no way of starting the tractor again.
As you can imagine, this was not a good place to be. If I didn’t do something quickly, the brakes wouldn’t hold, and the tractor would start rolling back down the hill. This would most likely end with a crash into the ditch! The only way to start the tractor was to jump down to the ground, run back to the trailer, grab the starter pack that we kept there, run back to the tractor, fasten the starter pack to the battery, jump back onto the tractor, and then start it. However, all that would have taken much too long and if I had let go of the brake, the crash that I had feared would have happened. Realizing the desperate situation I was in, I did the only thing I could do – I prayed with my whole heart.
I prayed once and tried to start the tractor. It coughed and choked a little but wouldn’t start. So, I prayed again; this time the starter jumped a little, as did my heart. But, just as quickly, it died again. For a third time, I sent a desperate prayer heavenward. By now the brakes were slipping… slipping… and slowly but surely the tractor was backing toward the deep ditch at the bottom of the hill. I jabbed the starter button, and the tractor jumped to life with a roar and a cloud of smoke! I quickly shoved the gear shift lever into gear and I was on my way again! As I chugged along, the sky was still blue, the birds were still singing, and the wind was still blowing, but most of all I was safe. With a thankful heart I breathed a prayer to God, for it was He and He alone, who had saved me from crashing on the hills of Holmes County that sunny day in August. I hope this story will help us remember that God, the One who made us all, is always watching over us.
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