WordUp by Chad Gramling

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I was reading an article in The Writer yesterday that talked about Ian Rankin, who is best known for a series of crime novels staring Detective Rebus. He relayed a story about how he was in a bar one day and a man introduced himself as Joe Rebus and asked Rankin to look him up in the phone book.

Oddly enough, J. Rebus lived on Rankin street.

Rankin then noted how it was a case of something happening in real life that he could never put into one of his stories . . . presumably because it was too coincidental or cheesy.

But that got me thinking about when in life that has happened to me. The one that comes immediately to my mind happens to be August 13, 1995 . . . the day I became a Christian.

Before that time, I hung out with the youth group of the church I now attend because a couple of my friends had recently become Christians and they were strong-arming me to do the same thing. It must have been a natural resistance to peer pressure or something, but I refused.

That day, they said the whole crew was going to a lake and invited me along. I thought nothing of it. Before I knew it, I was the center of a conversation and being prompted by become a Christian. I consciously chose to do so, but I think in the back of my mind I also knew that I was many miles from home with no phone or transportation of my own. I jokingly tell people I was spiritually ambushed that day.

But here’s where it gets interesting:

On the way home, my two friends and I were going through an area where the speed limit is 30, but you really feel like it should be 55, so you get negligent and unwittingly speed. One of my friends in the back seat said in an oddly somber tone; “You know what’s really cool? If we all died right now, we’d all go to heaven.”

I don’t think I or my other friend MTR, who was driving, knew how to respond so we kinda just said “Yeah, that is really cool” and went on with life.

Less then two minutes later, we see police lights from behind our vehicle. Sure enough, we were pulled over. The police officer comes to the window and does the typical thing. He tries to verbally establish his power and tries to invoke fear. Then he goes back to his car.

We sit there forever. Finally, another car shows up and the officer gets out. The two come to the door together and ask my friend to get out. My other friend and I are dumbfounded. As was MTR.

“Somethin’ yer not telling us MTR?” says one of them.

My friend didn’t know how to respond. “No. Not really,” he says.

“There’s a warrant for your arrest on drug trafficking in Ohio,” he says.

Before we know it, our friend is handcuffed and being persecuted by individuals who are designated “to protect and serve.” My other friend and I are confused and a little worried at this point. We were trying to figure out which one of us was going to drive our friend’s mom’s car home and tell her the news.

A little while later, after the officers had had their fun, they release MTR and tell him that there is someone in Ohio with the exact same first, middle and last name matching his description but having only a one or two number difference in social security number.

We probably cussed and vented in a very anti-Christian manner the rest of the way home. Most of all, I think each one of us were wondering to ourselves how something like that could happen. When we tell his mom (at that point, we were laughing about it), she goes ballistic and immediate starts calling friends that she thinks could have the ability to get the officers fired. She wanted retribution because they had “handcuffed her son!”

Lot’s of lessons here. At that time, I am sure the only thing we thought we had learned was that cops can be dicks.

But as I look back, I am sure we all learned much. We learned about the perils of of selfish Christian-think (we were feeling pretty full of ourselves and self-righteous at that moment). We learned that sometimes, you will be unfairly persecuted. We learned that even stupid laws that we don’t agree with are still laws - that can probably also be said for our heading of God’s word.

But the fact of the matter, it was a story that God outlined and unfolded for us to experience and know. It’s something that few authors would dare try to put into their story because they know it would be looked upon with a grain of disdain for being so coincidental that it could never happen in real life.

But it’s a true story. And I guess that’s why God is the ultimate author.

[tags]God, storytelling, authors, life, coincidences, memories, cops, harassment, persecution, speed traps, Born Again, Ian Rankin, Remus[/tags]