Road Work Ahead

Every day I commute 25 miles each way to and from work, and most days I'm in the car an hour and a half for that commute. Unless, of course, it's raining or snowing or there's an accident (or 3 or 4) or there's construction happening along my route. Then I could easily be in my car for hours and hours and hours. And I detest those days ... truly, utterly, completely, totally detest those days. If I didn't love my house and where I live, those days would almost be enough to convince me to sell out and move into a downtown loft right across the street from my office so I didn't have to make the drive every day.

This morning, about 20 minutes into my drive to work, as the traffic slowed, I noticed several large orange signs along the side of the road. I groaned aloud in the car as I read the dreaded words, "Road Work Ahead ... Be Prepared to Stop." All three lanes of traffic quickly drew to a complete stop, and I began searching through the songs on my iPod trying to find something that would soothe my frayed nerves and calm my growing anger over the morning delay. I settled on John Denver's greatest hits and cranked up the volume on my car radio. 

As I sat trapped in my car staring at the now giant orange sign to the right of my car, I found that I wasn't listening to the music at all. Instead, I was thinking about road work ... construction ... change ... things being torn down ... repairing and being made new. I realized that my thoughts had nothing to do with the highway my humming car was sitting upon, but rather my life, my heart, my mind, my soul. I found myself wishing that God would place a sign along the way ahead of me when He was going to disrupt my journey and cause me to slow down and eventually stop what I am doing. "Why can't You just warn me, God, before You tear apart the road I'm on and change everything? Why can't You just put up some orange signs to tell me things are going to get rough? Why do You have to work on me anyway? What do You want from me? Why do I have to take this detour ... this painful and difficult detour? Why do I need road work? Why? Why? Why?"

As the traffic started to move, I wiped the tears from my eyes, and began to hear God speak to my wounded and aching heart. "For I know the plans I have for you, Terrie ... trust Me. I'm working on your road for a reason ... trust Me. I'm causing you to stop so that you can begin anew ... trust Me. The new construction will be so much better than the old ... trust Me. Trust Me, Terrie, just trust Me."

I'm pretty sure I will never see another road work sign along the highway the same way again ... pretty sure indeed.

"Road Work Ahead ... Be Prepared to Stop."