As we started out from home to travel to Florida that cold winter day, there was snow on the ground, but the roads were dry. We were pulling a twenty-five-foot trailer that had its pivoting hitch in the center of our truck bed. We hoped that we wouldn’t run into ice, since we knew it was dangerous to pull a trailer on icy roads.
We had gone about a hundred miles when we ran into unusual conditions. It looked like it had snowed and then rained on top of the snow. Truck tires had packed this down, forming two tracks of icy snow on the road. However, in between the tracks the road was dry and the passing lane was dry.
I thought about turning back but foolishly decided to drive in the dry passing lane and keep going. This worked until cars and trucks traveling faster wanted me to move over into the driving lane so they could pass. I tried to straddle the icy tracks in the driving lane, and then a strong, crosswind came up. Suddenly something happened that all truck drivers fear - the trailer jackknifed! Just as you would fold up the blade of a jackknife, the trailer swung around and hit the cab of the truck. The impact broke the rear window behind my head, showering small pieces of glass down my back. Then it pulled the truck around, and we slid backwards into the ditch between the two roadways. The deep snow in the ditch and the hitch kept the trailer from turning over. But when it came to a stop, it was tilted at a forty-five-degree angle with two wheels on the ground and two wheels in the air.
As we sat in the cold truck waiting for the state police to come, we thanked the Lord for protecting us from injury and asked His help in getting out of the ditch and returning safely home.
We sat in the warm police car while the state trooper called a wrecker and filled out the accident report. He asked us where we had been headed. When we said, “Florida,” he said, “Well, you can still go there after checking your rig out.” I said to my wife on the way home, “If the Lord didn’t want us to go to Florida, I certainly am not going!”
The sad part about the whole accident was that we had not listened to a warning from a dear friend. He had visited us the day before we left. When he got home that night and heard a road report, he called us to warn us of the danger of that very road that we jackknifed on. Proverbs 8:3333Hear instruction, and be wise, and refuse it not. (Proverbs 8:33) warns, “Hear instruction, and be wise, and refuse it not.” We were not wise!
There is much warning in God’s Word about people who are living in their sins and are refusing or just not listening to the gospel of the grace of God. This good news tells how God loves us so much that He sent His own Son down here to bear the punishment for sinners on Calvary’s cross and give up His life. He rose from the dead and proclaims the victory: “I am the resurrection, and the life: he that believeth in Me, though he were dead, yet shall he live: and whosoever liveth and believeth in Me shall never die” (John 11:2525Jesus said unto her, I am the resurrection, and the life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live: (John 11:25)—26).
By not listening to the warning we were given, we ended up with much damage to our truck and trailer. We also could have been injured or lost our lives. Not listening to God’s warnings about your sins carries a much greater price. When the Lord Jesus comes to take to heaven all those who are saved from their sins, the door to heaven will be shut forever. Those who have not listened to His warnings will be left behind and will face judgment for their sins in that awful place the Bible calls hell.
ML-12/29/2002