Uncertain riches

I have a routine when I arrive for work: I lock the car doors, throw my pocketbook in the trunk, stuff the car keys in my jeans pocket, and clip the church keys to my belt. The other day I skipped a step and my car keys ended up in my pocketbook in the trunk. The glitch in the operation was not noticed until I walked out the church door three hours later and crossed the parking lot.

I think people should be punished for sins but not for mistakes, don’t you? Nevertheless, there I was, in the exact same parking slot where my car battery had died a few weeks earlier and Heidi had come with succor.

The first thing I did was go back into the church, get on my knees, and pray to the God who finds a way where there is no way. The “there is no way” part is due to the fact that I own no spare key, which is because the locksmith last year said he couldn’t make a copy, and the Mazda dealer he referred me to wanted $350 to do it. Thus, no way.

The second thing I did was stand behind my car and try all 13 church keys on the trunk lock, which you may laugh at. But 33 years ago, when we lived in an apartment on the main drag, I was demonstrating to my toddler the principle of keys and how they are made to fit only one lock, and I walked up to the printing store (after hours) and inserted my house key into its heavy front door and, lo and behold, it unlocked it. I looked this way and then that way and we slinked away. So you never know.

My husband arrived and we prayed again, and then felt we should believe that we will receive, since that’s what James 1:6-7 says is the condition for praying. Mindful that God’s help typically comes through means, we continued to brainstorm. My husband said police carry a Slim Jim tool to unlock locked vehicles but they don’t like to use them for cases like this because then they would be constantly on call for damsels in distress. I suggested we offer to pay the officer, as it would be cheaper than hiring a locksmith, but he said it’s illegal for public servants to accept payment. Ever hopeful, I stood on the sidewalk and tried to hail a Cheltenham cruiser.

Meanwhile, my husband called a locksmith service and it wanted $29.95 plus whatever the local emergency savior would charge. The local guy wanted $100. We said we had $80. He arrived in 15 minutes. His dubious tools included two inflatable pouches, an orange rubber suction syringe squeeze ball, and a long sturdy device for snagging my lock to the open position—which he did in less than two minutes.

Total earnings before taxes from three hours of work at the church: $40.80. Cost of retrieval of locked keys in trunk at job worksite: $80. It reminds me of the time I spent days painting the upstairs bedroom to save money on a professional. But when I was finished, I threw the last murky bucket of water into the toilet—with a wooden-handled paintbrush hidden in the murkiness that wound up lodged in the plumbing, making it necessary to buy a new toilet. If you count on money you will find it a fickle mistress indeed. Easy come easy go.

The Word of God says, “As for the rich in this present age, charge them not … to set their hopes on the uncertainty of riches …” (1 Timothy 6:17). It’s the “setting your hopes on it” part that is doomed to frustration and imponderable calculation, with its one-step-forward-and-one-step-backward property. At the end of the day “God … richly provides us with everything to enjoy.”

What happened to the God who finds a way when there is no way? Why didn’t He come through with one of the 13 keys I tried or a big-hearted cop with a Slim Jim? I can just hear my husband saying, “Andrée, He did find a way. You’re just upset because it cost you 80 bucks.”