Buddy, my new driver, was waiting for me when I got to the terminal. I had overslept after spending a lot of time sharing what I knew about the Bible with one of the new converts. As I climbed into the cab, there was a check waiting for me. "New policy," he said, "Since we are going to be on the road for a couple of weeks, they advanced you the money they estimate you will earn. If it is more or less, they will settle it at the end of the month."
That was interesting to me. I had been drawing checks marked "casual pay" and while it was always accurate, it always seemed to err in my favor. We were headed for St. Louis and then on to Elgin, IL but as it turned out the folks in St. Louis were not ready for us, so we drove over to Elgin and got them loaded. I mention that as I had always heard that the moving and storage people always charged more when the customer was not prepared to move on the date the move was scheduled. Such policies made it so much easier for us on the actual moves.
As it was, we had a chance to talk at length before we got to Elgin. My driver was interested in hearing about the "miracle" in Charleston that I had mentioned when they called me to report. Buddy was like me, I told him, for too many years I had been a church goer rather than preparing myself to be a Christian. Now, we had a serious talk. His wife was the Christian in their family and it was she who shared what she knew with their boys. When Buddy got home, there were always those session where the boys were asking their Dad if he believed the same as their mother. At least, he said he tried to be honest. He was learning as he learned. So, we spent lots of our time on the road, in Bible study.
Those sessions were precious to me as I took my studies, seriously. I had learned that not all churches had the exact same beliefs and often, this "taught" their members to be sensitive to the needs of those they chose to invite to church. I look back on those sessions and wonder, why can't we all learn to listen to the various interpretations and make up our own minds as to how we relate to the Bible?
Bible study is a lot like loading furniture or machinery on to a moving man and getting it safely from one place to another. Some parts are very fragile and you must be careful where you place then while loading and unloading. Others you can stack three and four high and they look like they just came off the show room floor on the day they were purchased. And there are always the pieces that have become worn through use over the years. You still pay careful attention to all of them, but you also know that some can deal with rough handling and no one would ever know the difference.
St. Louis and Elgin were safely loaded and we headed back to Fort Wayne for temporary storage. We merely "dropped" the one trailer and hooked up to another and were on our way - to the motel. That was the benefit we had in moving from one place to another. And for me, it afforded more opportunity to share what I knew along the way. Buddy was intrigued on our first trip together as he thought that people might be offended if we ever got into a question regarding religion, but I think I assured him that most were as "hungry" for the truth as he was on the day we met.
On this trip, we were together for over three weeks and then there would be times when he would come into the South for only one or two pick ups or deliveries. Whenever he headed my way, I could be assured of a call. That worked well with the week end jobs I had developed with a company that specialized in epoxy overlays in older industrial plants.
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