Reflections by Doc Arnett

The rationalizations started as soon as I saw him standing beside Highway 36 on a hot Kansas afternoon, just east of US-7 near Troy. “Someone else will pick him up soon.” “He’ll find a ride.” “He can walk.” As I came close, I saw him looking at me, thumb pointed toward the east, skin dark, hope turning to disappointment on his face. Before I was even past him, another voice began to speak in my mind, “Whatever you would that others do to you…”

A quarter mile down the road, I slowed, turned left and headed back. He watched cautiously as I wheeled a U-turn and pulled onto the shoulder behind him. When he realized I was stopping for him, a big smile lit up his face and he trotted toward me. He hesitated beside the car and I opened the front door. “Oh, thank you, Jesus,” he exclaimed, quickly laying a notebook and Bible on the seat. “Let me put my backpack in the back here.”

There was another, “Praise you, God” as he finished that little chore, closed the back door and then slid into the passenger’s seat in the front. “I’m William Jones,” he smiled, offering his hand, “Thank you so much.”

For the next twenty miles, he told me about his ministry. “I was on my way into work one Monday morning and the Lord told me, ‘Go home and read your Bible.’ I told him, ‘Lord, I’m on my way to work.’ The Lord said, ‘Go home and read your Bible.’ So, I turned around and went home and read my Bible. That happened for three Mondays in a row.

“My boss called me in and said, ‘Willie, my customers and I agree; you’re the best paint and body man in Oklahoma. Is there some reason why you need Monday’s off? Because if there is, I’ll give you Monday’s off and I’ll pay you for them.'”

Willie looked at me and grinned, “Can you believe that? I got paid to stay home and read my Bible. Since then, I’ve gone out on the road with my Bible. I’ve been out for two-and-a-half years this time. The Lord will send me up north five hundred miles for one little lost sheep. Then, he’ll send me south for one little lost sheep. I find them on the street, under bridges, behind old buildings. I just go whenever he sends me. I’m on my way to West Virginia now.”

I looked at Willie’s leathery skin, his neat clothes and listened to his stories. I gave him a ride and a little cash, left him at the McDonald’s by I-29 on the south side of Saint Joe. I don’t know if he got another ride right away or not.

But I do know that I envy his faith.

Mid-morning, the heat index flirted with the century mark, not atypical for July in northwest Missouri. By mid-day, a dark sky moved in with its cool winds, head-butting the mercury downward by fifteen degrees in less than an hour. As we drove through Saint Joe, the breeze seemed almost chilly.

Such is the nature of weather across most of the country and, from rumors and reports we hear from time to time, across the planet. No doubt, it’s a common saying in parts of Russia, places in China and certain segments of Slobovnia, “If you don’t like our weather, just wait a couple of days; it’ll change.”

It seems that some aspects of our economy have taken on a similar nature: gas and other energy prices, hiring practices, and the marketplace. Employment in some sectors becomes an oxymoron while jobs flourish in another. Some people accumulate tremendous profits while others struggle to get unemployment claims accepted. Even in the worst of times, some people gain an advantage. Even in the best of times, some experience loss.

It is not a sparing from these fickle changes of the world that people of faith have gained. Rather, it is a securing of those things permanent, which endure beyond the world and its fluctuations. The comfort of salvation instead of the striving of desperation. The peace that comes from knowing that this season of mortality and its afflicting fears will be replaced by an endless age of blessing. The beauty of holiness instead of the deceits of appearance. A present knowing of faith, hope and love and that incredible liberation of knowing that love will endure even after faith and hope have been fulfilled. Now that’s a change worth waiting for.