Rerouted

    Scottie and I had agreed to meet at the Central Park Plaza around 6:15pm to join the rest of our team at home. We wanted to spend as much time as we could in the city as long as it was before the sun went down. We went our separate ways and spent a full, adventurous day in Antigua. There’s something beautiful about adventuring alone with God for a day. When we met, we were tired, a little hungry, and ready to get home. But when we tried to order an Uber, it wouldn’t work. 

    Surely this had to be a mistake right? We had wifi, everything else was working, we saw other people getting in Ubers right before our eyes, there’s no way it wasn’t working. As we tried and retried, nothing would work. The sky had steadily faded into black, the ATMs weren’t allowing us to take out money, my phone was dying, and the Uber app still refused to work. We were stuck. Laughing at our luck, I turned to Scottie and said, “This is no coincidence.”

    Something being on the race has taught me is to see things beyond face value. Even the mildest circumstances are deeper than what meets the eye. You could look at it as misfortune that we were in these circumstances or you could see it as God. I’m starting to see how woven into the smallest details of our days he is.  

    So we decided we would have to find a different way home. Into the unknown we went. We strayed away from the comfort of the town square and wandered the streets, praying and laughing as we walked until we heard a familiar buzz and rattling. It was a Tuk Tuk, a little three-wheeled vehicle I’d like to describe as a fancy golf cart. Scottie flagged down our new ride and off we went. 

    I wish I could tell you this is an insane story about how we met this guy, prayed for him, and something radical happened. But this isn’t that kind of story. This story is one of how God speaks and guides us in our everyday situations and how he spoke to me through this one. 

    God wants to take us down unknown pathways to promised destinations. Scottie and I knew the destination, God just decided to take us a new, unexpected, uncomfortable way to get there. Despite all those things, we still had joy in the midst of our wacky circumstances. What has God promised you? If you’re like me, as soon as God gave you that promise, you started devising ways to make it happen/routing the path before you. We never seem to get to our promise the way we plan to, and no matter how much harder the path God carves out may seem, it is still woven with joy. 

    Maybe being rerouted shouldn’t be such an uncommon thing in our lives. Perhaps it is made to be a lifestyle.