A Contemplative At The Car Wash

A Contemplative at the Car Wash

Open-air parking and a pair of seventy-year-old oak trees sent me to the car wash. I could have done the job with a hose and a bucket, but I happened to pass a drive-through car wash on my way home. A perky girl chirped her greeting on-screen then told me to select my wash and insert cash or credit card. Two tokens for vacuuming dropped with a clink when I did so. Next I drove toward the rolling belt that captured my tires and pulled me forward.

Then the real fun began.

I was on a track I could not see, moving at a rate of speed I could not control. I couldn’t back up. Moving arms and brushes assaulted my car, flinging foamy soap every which way and slapping the windshield and windows with surprising force. Once the brushes descended completely, my vision was obscured. I could have been around the corner from my home or in Ukraine, for all I could tell. I heard threatening thumps just inches away, and my car rocked slightly as it eased forward. I couldn’t see where I’d started or how near or far the end might be. I didn’t know what spray or gel or finishing agent would come at me next.

The car wash is a lot like life.

I may entertain the illusion of control, at least for a while. But not for long. I’m in a groove that won’t let me go and moving under a power not my own. I can’t manipulate the mess and motion around me or command the things threatening me to stop. But I’m held. And safely. No matter what threats assail me or for how long, I will be released at the appointed time—buffed, blown dry, and clean, and surely better for the worry and wear.

Imagine receiving far more than eight dollars’ worth of spiritual tutoring not three minutes from home! If the owners of the car wash knew what they were dispensing along with the foam and film and spray, I bet they’d find a way to charge extra.

Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? . . . In all these things we overwhelmingly conquer through Him who loved us.

Romans 8:35, 37, NASB