Directing Traffic

Some new apartments are being built near a grocery store.
Construction is always interesting to me.
It is often difficult to imagine the finished product.
From foundation, framing, and installation of windows, the process is intriguing.

These particular apartments are close to the road.
What used to be open field is now concrete.
I could hear farmer, author, and poet, Wendell Berry, protest.
I could hear his lament for open spaces.

When despair for the world grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting with their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.
(The Peace of Wild things, by Wendell Berry)

So much concrete.
Story upon story blocking the view.
Multiple levels of a concrete parking garage smacking me in the face as I walk out of the store.
Some call it progress.

I cannot imagine there is a need for more apartments.
I guess someone, somewhere, would disagree with my assessment.
I see another bank on another corner.
I see a new drug store just a few miles from another one.

I thought of Berry’s words.
The peace of wild things.
I am sad to see the wild things being displaced.
I am sad to see the open places being covered with concrete.

I needed to drive in that parking lot.
One lane was closed because of construction vehicles.
All traffic, both coming and going, had to drive on one side of the road.
As I drove to my destination, there was a man in a neon vest directing traffic.

As I was leaving, that man was gone.
In his place was another man, standing not in the street but on the curb.
He had no neon vest.
He had no flag in his hand.

I approached the stop sign, which he was waving people through.
Since he had no neon vest, no flag, and was standing on the curb it was hard to see him.
I watched his hand as he waved me through.
As I was almost in front of him, he put his hand up for me to stop, while he was still waving.

Which way was he waving?
Another car came from the other direction.
I drove up to the intersection.
The other car came quickly in my direction.

The car horn, that I do not use very much, was used in this instant.
The man kept coming and turning through the intersection in the parking lot.
He said choice words to me through his back window that I was glad I could not hear.
I looked at the person directing traffic in total confusion.

Only by God’s grace did we not hit.
There was a whisper thin space between our cars.
I thanked God for His protection and intervention.
I drove to my next destination, a little shaky, yet so very grateful.

I will instruct you and teach you in the way you should go; I will counsel you with my loving eye on you. (Psalm 32:8)

I am so grateful that God guides us carefully and tenderly.
God does not need a neon vest or a flag in His hand.
God’s Word directs us.
God’s Word tells us the way we should go.

God is a God of order not confusion.
God does not tell us to go this way and then change His mind.
Confusion has the enemy’s fingerprints all over it.
The enemy loves to send mixed messages.

I hope that other drivers were safe as this person directed traffic so haphazardly.
God does nothing haphazardly.
God will never lead us carelessly.
We are too important to Him.