"Carl, You're Going To Hit It!"

Cue The Good, The Bad And The Ugly theme.

In the summer of 1964, the legend goes, my father, his brother John, and his cousin Glenn were groggily slumped in the backseat of my grandparents' '58 Buick station wagon, headed into Carlsbad to see my great-Aunt Anna and Uncle Al. My grandpa was driving and my grandmother was asleep in the front seat. All were looking forward to the end of a long journey across the desert.
Did I mention that it was 1:45 a.m. and pitch-dark except for the car's headlights? It was the sixties, when men were men and drove beastly station wagons at odd hours out west.
My Uncle John picked up the story here and said that they were approaching a small bridge with a red reflector on each side. Suddenly out of the quiet darkness came two deep gasps for air and the unforgettable shriek, "CARL! CARL! You're going to hit it!"

I've always loved this story, not only for the comedic value (and my father's chortling while telling it) but for the glimpse into how fear affects us.

Fear. Fear because of incorrect perceptions or being caught unawares. Sometimes it's justified fear. Uncle John said that to be fair to Grandma, you had to look at the events from earlier that day. In the scorch of the late-evening twilight as they left Vegas and headed out across the desert, Grandpa passed a tractor trailer on a steep up-grade, causing all passengers to become instant believers in the possibility that this trip might never end in Carlsbad, but out on a lonely two-lane road in the middle of nowhere.

This past week I've been thinking a lot about how to move forward in spite of fear. Let's be clear: I'm not advocating a '90s No Fear bumper sticker mentality. The fear of the Lord (Psalm 111:10) seems to be a good thing, to say the least. My prayer is that I never let fear get in the way of serving God.

(Many thanks to Uncle John for his keen memory of the story's details.)