One Moment

It's been a month since I last wrote on here and I guess I had kind of almost checked out (so to speak) from trying to do much on here anymore. However, 2 events have happened that made me want to write about them and hopefully share some encouragement along the way.

Yesterday afternoon, I took the kids to Target to return a few things and let the kids spend a little bit of their birthday money. As usual for Target, it was frantically crazy in the store with people almost sprinting to a checkout line. The parking lot was about 5 times as bad, with cars speeding up & down the aisles, people darting in and out among the cars and people generally growing impatient waiting to find or leave a parking space.

I was no exception.

We got into the Sequoia and I saw about 3 cars behind me all playing some sort of automobile checkers where one car moved out, another moved in and yet another moved forward. This was becoming quite a tedious and somewhat annoying game and I started to get a little antsy. However, all seemed well and good when the lane behind me cleared up and I saw I could pull out of my parking spot.

Apparently the lady behind me thought the very same thing at the very same time.

You can see where this is going.

As I gingerly pulled out of my spot, my SUV suddenly and yet gently "rocked" back and forth and I heard a soft crack behind me. I knew immediately what had happened. I'd hit someone and/or someone had hit me.

Sure enough, a minivan had backed into me as I backed into her. I became instantly livid, not so much at her but more at me for not waiting a little longer and at the overall situation. This was all I needed...a wrecked truck just days before we were to leave for Austin and an assuredly expensive bill to get my bumper fixed and painted.

What also got me was how quickly, how in a moment, my life had instantly changed. Nothing had been indicated that I was about to hit the van behind me. Nothing even pointed to me having a bad day all of a sudden. Nothing had been revealed that I was about to regret taking the kids to the store for a brief shopping excursion.

And yet...life had suddenly changed. Just like that.

In one brief moment, all that I had known was different.

Now, this morning, I received an email from a friend of mine that a girl who we'd gone to school with, a girl we had all just seen at our 20 year reunion in September, had been killed back on July 5th in a tragic, senseless car accident. From all I can gather, it appears she had gotten out of her SUV w/out realizing she hadn't put it in park. The SUV was on a slope and as she exited the vehicle, it rolled down on top of her, dragging her down the driveway.

She was 39 and leaves behind a husband and 2 kids.

Again, it became painfully obvious how quickly life can change. How in one split second, all that we know can become suddenly foreign and in some cases, unfathomable.

It makes me just stop and realize how much God has blessed my life. He has given me an incredible wife and kids, family and friends and most of the comforts anyone could ever ask for. He has blessed me by allowing me to live in the greatest country in the world, even though it seems like all we as Americans do is fight with one anohter.

Most importantly, He considered me worth it when He took my sin and shame all the way to the cross and died for my sins. What joy and what peace it brings to my life to know that when I die, whether it be in a moment or after a lengthy battle with my diabetes, I will go to rest with Him in Heaven.

I'm not going to go into some long-winded exposition on salvation or anything like that. All I'm going to say is cherish the moment you have now, love the ones near you, tell the ones away from you how much you care for them and make the absolute most of the time you have in front of you right now.

As I've seen within the past 24 hours, life can and often does change in just a moment.