On our second Last Trip (a story for another time), Jerry and I planned to meet in Ogden on Sunday, May 19, 2024, so the day before at 7 AM I pulled out of Temecula on I-15 heading north with reservations in Richfield, Utah, about 560 miles away. An easy jaunt for my Honda CTX1300, and doable on the 76-year-old body. A brief gas stop in Barstow led to lunch in Vegas…a decent sandwich shop next to the gas station. Double dipping, I guess. A lot of deserts until I passed St. George at 400 miles, with just over two hours to go. But after Cedar City the clouds began rolling in, some white, some pretty dark. From some I could see the rain slapping the ground, then the road turned away for ten miles, and I thought I dodged the storm.
But few roads near the Utah mountains stay straight, and the next turn took us right into the darkest clouds and the rain came. Hard. So with no place to get off, and needing to make Richfield, I had no choice except to go on. Then I flashed back ten years to a trip to meet the guys in Rexburg, ID, destination Glacier National Park. The same road, the same spot, not much past Cedar, and that storm brought heavy enough winds that I had to lean the bike left to offset the west winds, and I hunkered down in my jacket and behind the windscreen. Not much help, and I tightened up to keep control of the bike in the storm for over 40 miles. My lower back and my trapezius muscles below my neck felt like iron, and the hot tub at the Nephi motel soothed me for well over an hour to loosen my muscles.
But I learned a lesson: when it gets cold or windy or wet, relax. That sounds counterintuitive, but it works. So when this rain came down, I told my body to chill, to not tighten. Yeah, that may require out loud communication. When Richfield arrived, the old body felt pretty decent. Maybe not good, but decent is OK.
I responded on the first storm like most of us do when hard times and problems and worries hit us. We tighten up when we should counterintuitively chill. Relax in the face of your rain. Don’t expect the rain to stop, but just go to God. One verse has saved my sanity multiple times, “Don’t worry about anything; instead, pray about everything. Tell God what you need, and thank him for all he has done. Then you will experience God’s peace, which exceeds anything we can understand” (Philippians 4:6-7, NLT).
My prayer? “God, please stop the storm, but most importantly, may I avoid worry by resting in you. You’ve got me, whatever happens.” That presence brought a relaxing calm.
Kick Starting the Application
Do you sometimes fight your obstacles and concerns by stressing, by pulling into yourself? How much worry do you carry? Have you tried praying about everything and thanking God for his presence and peace? Will you do that with your next hard time?