I had some requests to repost something I posted about a year ago, my patio furniture story. So, here it is again as this week’s Word of Witness: “Asking for Help” By Doug Stockton One spring day, my wife Linda and I were shopping on a Saturday morning for curtains. As we entered Penney’s, we noticed a greatly-reduced patio furniture set. “How long is this set on sale?” I asked the clerk at the customer service counter. “Only until noon. It’s a door-buster sale,” he replied. We weren’t particularly shopping for patio furniture. But, we couldn’t pass up this great deal. This was Mistake No. 1 for the long day ahead. We bought the set, finished shopping for curtains, and headed home, intending to either beg, borrow, or steal a truck to return later that afternoon to pick up our new furniture. After I dropped Linda at our home some 30 miles from the store, I headed back out. But, I didn’t go looking for a truck. I headed back to the Mall, because I had already decided that I could probably get the entire set of six stackable chairs and a five-foot table in my car. This was Mistake No. 2. While my car wasn’t a sub-compact, it wasn’t exactly a full-sized vehicle either. When the same clerk who had waited on me earlier brought out the furniture on a huge cart, he could only shake his head as he looked at my car. He helped me lift the table in its cardboard box onto the top of the car. Then chuckling with an impish smile on his face, he left me there with the chairs sitting beside the car. Because the chairs were stackable, I was able to put them all in the trunk, only sticking out about four feet. The table required some serious securing. I put down all four car door windows and began to wrap the table with the rope that I had brought. I went in and out of each window about two to three times, tightly securing the table to the roof of my car. I knotted the rope several times, so that it could not come loose. The table was going nowhere. Then, I began to open the driver’s side door to get in the car to head home. Mistake No. 3 suddenly became apparent. All four doors were tied tightly shut and could not be budged unless the ropes were unknotted. By this time, I was aware that a crowd had gathered and was watching me with great curiosity. Not wanting to undo any of the rope which would have required me cutting some of the very tight knots, and not wanting to appear as if I didn’t know what I was doing, I proceeded to enter the driver’s window feet-first in the style of a NASCAR race car driver. Mistake No. 4. The first foot was easy. The second had me hanging on for dear life. As I pulled and wiggled myself up to about my waist, I could hear the onlookers chuckling. It took me a good three to four minutes to force my belly and chest into the car. For those who don’t know me, I stand six feet, three inches, weighing almost three hundred pounds. My car’s window was not built for this kind of girth. At one point, I was sure my chest and shoulders were completely stuck. But, with a final grunt, I landed prone on my back inside the car. People were now laughing out loud. My only consolation was that there were no cameras around. Otherwise, I am certain that I would have ended up on “You Tube” or somewhere else on the Internet. As I drove home, two things came to my mind. The first was my hurt pride and the second was the fact that there was no way I was going to be able to get back out the car in the same manner I got in. So, when I entered town, I called home to Linda to ask for a little help. “Hi, hon. Do you remember that scene in Rocky where Rocky, with his eye swollen shut, tells Mickey, ‘Cut me!’ Well, I need you to come out and cut me out of the car when I get home in a few minutes.” As I related my story to her, she tried not to laugh. But, she couldn’t help herself. When I arrived home, I was very grateful for her help in cutting the ropes and releasing me from my knotty predicament. Later, I had time to think about each of the mistakes I made along the way. If I had only asked for help earlier in the day, the whole thing could have been avoided. The whole incident reminded me of how we all make mistakes in our life because we don’t take time to ask for God’s help. And God simply waits for us to ask for help through prayer. While many of our problems in life are of our own making, God wants to help us, if we’ll only ask.
Posted on: Thu, 21 Aug 2014 01:02:31 +0000
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