Do You Ever Think That ... Life Is Boring ???

Random thoughts this evening ...

"Life is what you make of it."

"Life is only boring, if you let it be."

"Life is a daily adventure, if you look for it."

Today COULD have been a pretty boring day.  


VERY boring ... in fact.  


Miles and miles of brown, flat,  
barren, and BORING landscape.

A 350+ mile drive ... 
with 4 quiet young children ... 
with no ROWDY & FUN Big Kids.  


Yep ... it COULD have been boring.

But ... it wasn't.  

Instead of BORING  ...  


...  our day was UNIQUE  


...  it was INTERESTING  


...  it was definitely a new kind of family ADVENTURE.

We took a risk.

We didn't live in fear.

We stepped "Out of the Box".

Just as we were about to turn onto the freeway entrance ramp ... I noticed ... the HITCH-HIKERS.

Young 20's ... young lady with a ponytail, wearing Carrhart overalls ... young man with curly, floppy hair, playing the guitar.  I looked at all of the empty seats in the back of the van ... I looked at Jim ... I told him they looked just like we did when we were their age and we hitch-hiked.  Jim looked at me quizzically and said, "You want me to pick them up?"  "Yes!"  He pulled over.  By this time we were 1/2 way up the freeway entrance ramp.  I had to yell to get their attention.  

As they ran towards us, the girl yelled, "Do you have room for our two friends?"  Jim looked at me.  I counted seats ... and said, "Sure."  They had 2 more friends down the street, on another corner.  They all ran towards us, arms loaded down with backpacks.  "Okay kids ... let's move things around in here.  We've gotta make room for our new friends."

As the young lady climbed into the van, she accidently dropped her bottle of hard liquor, and it broke on the pavement.  For a split second, I thought, "What have I just gotten us into?"  But ... the Lord gave me peace that we were doing the RIGHT THING.

And ... we spent the next 6 hours enjoying the company of this crazy group of young adults (ages 20 & 21 ... the 1 young lady and 3 young men).  

They all attend college in Montana, and they had decided that a trip to Seattle sounded like a fun Spring Break.  So, they stuck out their thumbs and held up their signs.  Yesterday, when they left Montana, they had all gotten a ride quite quickly, that had brought them to eastern Washington.  They then spent the night "outside".  (I believe they slept "under the bridge" with the homeless population.)  And, this morning, they had been standing on the street corner for 4 HOURS waiting for a ride to Seattle.  They had been pretty discouraged before we pulled up; and they had just broken up into 2 groups, thinking it impossible that all 4 would get a ride together.  

They were sooo ... thankful that we stopped, and that we had room for all of them and their gear.

I don't believe any of them are Believers ... and we didn't feel it was our job today to preach to them.  We just asked them a lot about themselves ... their life experiences ... their goals ... their studies.  And, we shared our lives with them.  We told them about our Road Trips ... they told us about their hitch-hiking trips.  We exchanged stories about New York and New Orleans.  Two of them had even been to Africa before, so we shared stories of which wild animals we had seen there.  

They told us about their parents.  We told them about our young adult children.  They are all in college because that is where their parents want them to be (and I believe that all of their parents are paying for their educations).  However ... none of them really want to be there.  They want to be OUT ... EXPERIENCING life.  We told them of all of the LIFE EXPERIENCES that our young adult children have had.  One young man said he'd rather be a logger, out working in the woods.  Another, had changed his major 3 times already ... all he really wants to do is play his guitar.  The 3rd young man wants to be a writer, and he was reading an Ernest Hemingway book as his little lady napped on his shoulder.

Near the end of the ride, when one of the young men thanked us again (as they had done ALL day), I turned to him and said, "If it were my young adult children out on the street corner, I would hope that a nice family would stop and pick them up."  He was really touched by my reasoning.

When Elijah drew pictures and showed them to one of the guys .... this young man pulled out a few of his own pictures that he had recently drawn.  Later, Elijah pulled out a deck of cards and played games with one of the young men for an hour or two.

They fell asleep in the van (as they probably hadn't gotten much sleep under the bridge).  They woke each other up if the snoring got too loud.  We all laughed.

We stopped at Wendy's for lunch.  As we sat down inside, they said that they were going to go out and eat on the lawn.  When we were finished, we found them all asleep in the grass by the van.  (I took their picture, but can't upload it tonight.)

When we dropped them off on another street corner ... 300 miles and 6 hours later ... I gave each of them a business card.  I had written my blog address on the back, and told them that they could read more about our crazy family if they were interested.  

I don't know ...  

... if the cards were tucked away in their pockets, 

    or dropped in the gutter.  

... if we'll ever hear from them again, 

    or if they'll stop by to visit the blog, 

    or drop me an email.  

... if their lives were touched, 

    or if we were "just another ride".  

But, I do know ...

...  that we did the RIGHT THING.

...  that the Lord gave us a deep love for them.

...  that the Lord touched each of our lives, through them.

...  that our day was definitely NOT boring.

...  that we need to ALWAYS be open to the 

     ADVENTURES that the LORD has for us.

I also know  ...

...  it doesn't matter that they had hard liquor

...  it doesn't matter that they were smoking cigarettes

...  it doesn't matter that they told stories of illegal activities.

What does matter ???

All 4 of these young adults are children of the Lord and we were called to love them.  

...  We didn't have to try to love them.  

...  We didn't have to pretend to love them.  

...  We weren't called to love them, 
      for who they could become tomorrow.

...  We were called to love them, 
      for who they are today, 
      just as they are.

And, we did.  


We loved them.  


We enjoyed them.  


We looked into their eyes and saw young adults wanting to be free to find out REALLY what life is all about.  

I hope and pray that our family was  ...

... an example to them. 

... a light in the darkness. 

... a seed planted in their hearts.


... a new kind of love for them.

What would we have missed out on, 

if we had just kept on driving?

What would these 4 young adults have 

missed out on, if we hadn't taken a risk?

Thank you Jesus ... for another ADVENTURE on this crazy journey of FAITH that you have our family on.