Unbelievable

So I told you last week I had to tell you guys about something crazy that happened to me. It took me forever to write this because it was just such a crazy experience. Even now I think it was so much more than this story. I couldn't even fall asleep that night thinking about the craziness of it all. But here's the story...

Our small Bible study group has been meeting at the same apartment complex for over a year- different apartments, but all in the same complex. Last Tuesday was just like any other Tuesday. We were set to meet at 7, but this Tuesday a few girls couldn’t make it for various reasons. We thought about cancelling the meeting, but in the end decided to go ahead and have it since over half of us could make it.

After the meeting we all walked out to our cars and saw a huge yellow car boot on one of the girl’s tires along with a notice from a towing company on her window. We soon discover that ALL of us were unable to go home! Two girl’s cars had been towed and the other 3 of us had a boot on our cars!

Apparently in this apartment complex all the residents have stickers on the front windshields. None of the spaces were marked, but there were apparently spots specifically designated for visitors. Apparently there is a small sign when you come into the complex notifying you are the parking rules, but seriously none of us ever saw that? Somehow all of us managed to “break the rules” on the exact same night? Our group leader thought she had told us all. She felt horrible about the situation.

The tow truck guy said it would be $125 cash for each car that was booted and $250 for each car that was towed. We were all devastated. Some were quickly checking their bank accounts to see if they had enough to get their car back! We were trying to figure out a plan as to how we were going to get cash for the guy when all of our cars were immobile. Three of the girls jumped in the car with our group leader to head to the ATM armed with the debit cards and PIN numbers for the other 2 girls while they waited with her roommate and the tow truck guys.

“Can we at least get a group discount?...I mean we were at Bible study! We really did not know we were doing something wrong!” we asked holding up our Bibles.

“I know…I know the stickers on your cars. I used to go to the Summit. I know JD. I know what ya’ll are about”

Ummm…was this a good thing or a bad thing? We weren’t sure. But we gave him our best puppy dog eyes pleading for at least a price reduction.

“Ok, I’ll give you $25 off. $100 each.”

We were happy but as we stood there in the freezing cold we couldn’t help but wonder why this man no longer went to the Summit and why this had happened tonight and why we seemed to cross paths with him in this way.

So we asked “Why don’t you go to the Summit anymore?”

He told us about how he had gone through a really painful divorce and kind of got into a depression and couldn’t even work for 9 months. He told us how he started dating someone new but they just couldn’t seem to make it to church together on Sundays and how now with his work schedule he couldn’t make it there. We told him about the different service times. He told us how he thought his problems were bigger than anyone at the church could handle.

Luckily our group leader’s roommate is a part of the Celebrate Recovery ministry at the Summit. She started telling him all about it and where and when they met and how it could maybe help him through what was going on in his life. He seemed really interested.

About that time the other girls got back with the money. We started handing over our money wanting to cry because really we are all broke and could not afford this. But somehow it turned into laughter. We joked about how this was the most expensive Bible study ever and how we could come up with a really good slogan for the Summit’s Small Group campaign about it only costing you $100 to join our small group. We joked how we needed to get into the towing business because it seemed so lucrative. I mean this was such an unbelievable situation all we could do is laugh at it.

We even took a picture with the tow truck, car boots, and our Bibles.

News spread to the other girls who didn’t get to come via Facebook that night and we were seriously now all bonded by this unbelievable experience. We talked about how maybe this had happened because God needed us to speak truth into that man’s life. “Well” I joked, “God don’t make it cheap does he?”