I had it all planned. As I told you in recent weeks, my second cousin, Caleb Hawley, made some headlines on American Idol, advancing up to the final twenty-four and earning rave reviews along the way. Well, Caleb was performing tonight in Houston so I decided to go. It wasn't close to my place, about forty-five minutes or so depending on the traffic, but I had computer directions courtesy of mapblast.com. Caleb's mom, the wonderful Vicki, e-mailed today from Germany and told me she was happy I was going to be able to see her son. I fueled up the car and even washed it in preparation for my foray across Houston. I had my camera and extra batteries so maybe I could send pictures to Vicki and her husband, my ex-college roommate, Dale, of their youngest performing on stage in Texas. I left my apartment early, making sure I had plenty of time. Two hours of driving, sixty-six miles on the odometer, and eight dollars worth of toll booth charges later, no concert, no Caleb, no pictures to send. You see, the mapblast directions left off one bit of information. To get to the concert, I had to get on the Tomball Parkway. But mapblast assumes the user of the directions has an EZ Tag, which I do not. When I got to the Tomball Parkway, I learned that you could not enter without that EZ Tag. I took another road, I doubled back, I tried to figure out another way from the mapblast printout, I asked directions, but the only thing I found was that without a GPS system, I was sunk. Rarely am I frustrated but this is one of those nights.
Many mornings when I wake up, I ask the Lord for something to write about that day. This seems to be one of those be careful what you ask for lessons. I'm not good at getting around Houston- growing up in Nebraska did not prepare me for motoring around a city of four million. Still, I thought I had everything under control. I vaguely remember a ballgame we traveled to where I could not take my car because of the EZ TAG issue but it never crossed my mind this afternoon. I feel guilty. In the past two days, I emailed both Caleb and his folks and then I don't show. In Proverbs 16, verse 25, Solomon wrote, "There is a way which seems right to a man, but its end is the way of death." (NASB) I thought I was doing everything right but I didn't end up where I wanted to go or where I was believed I was going. Jesus spoke of the two roads to heaven, one wide and one narrow. In Matthew chapter seven and verse thirteen, the Savior teaches that, "small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it." He tells us in John 14 that He is THE WAY and the path to the Father. Unlike the Tomball Parkway, there was no easy pass to provide the road to heaven for us. What a toll He paid for us on the cross. That's the one road I really can't afford to miss. And since I was in absentia for the concert, I'll just have to settle for one of Caleb's CDs. Maybe he'll play Houston again and give me another chance.
To hear Caleb for yourself, please visit his website at http://calebhawley.com/
Applicable quote of the day:
“Discoveries are often made by not following instructions, by going off the main road, by trying the untried.”
Frank Tyger
God bless,
Steve
Luke 18:1
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