Three Rolls and a Divine Thud

After an eventful time preparing for a much-anticipated union-wide youth congress in Namibia, I settled into my seat as we departed from the Botswana-Namibia border. The group of seventeen, mostly young people, fell back into our two-vehicle convoy, excited to have begun the final leg of what had already been a twenty-four-hour trip from our home country of Eswatini. We had already traveled through two countries, and now we had entered the third one—Namibia. We still had about a nine-hour drive remaining before we would reach our destination. All hope of making it to the opening ceremony had been dashed by many delays along the way. We had made peace with the fact that we would arrive at six o’clock on Sabbath morning and had already planned to skip the post-road-trip rest in order to jump into a shower, get dressed in our Adventist Youth uniform, and go to worship the Lord with throngs of other young people from Lesotho, Namibia, and South Africa. At least, that was our plan.

Hours later, after a stop in Windhoek, the capital city of Namibia, those of us who were traveling in the seven-seater vehicle fell into a deep sleep, induced mainly by the fatigue and sleep deprivation of two days of traveling. I was not sure how long I had been asleep when I woke up to the scraping sound of the tires trying to grip the edge of the narrow, tarred road and the descending dirt area that ran alongside it. The van had rolled, and I was upside down. As it rolled the second time, I screamed for Jesus, and when it rolled the third time, my only thought was, So this is how it ends. In response to my resigned conclusion, I heard a loud thud. The van had stopped turning. Miraculously we all survived with only minor to moderate injuries. We missed the Sabbath service that we had long anticipated. But we experienced a divine service of a special kind that day—a service of deliverance on the Lord’s day.

What delays, frustrations, and unexpected overturns have you experienced along this Christian journey? Give them to God, my friends.

He is able to minister to you even as the billows roll.

Nolwazi Gumbi