Bad isn't always bad

This is the first “newish” car that I had purchased in a long, long time. When I purchased it I went into it way over my head financially. Drastically so—but I wanted that car, I had to have that car, I deserved that car. Or so I thought. At the age when I bought it, I was very certain that it would be the last car I would be buying. It was spotless when I bought it. Seven short months later I totaled it. I was devastated. I had killed my baby.

We tend to go through some rather raw emotions when bad things happen don’t we? We find ourselves so absorbed in what is happening in the now of the situation that we often fail to look at the big picture. It is in those bad moments of time when we typically don’t to God for any reason other than help in the immediate time frame. We seldom see the possibility of that bad event as a part of God’s overall plan for us, or protection of us. Almost always those thoughts arise when we retrospectively look back at the bad situation.

At the time that I killed that car, I had just started to think about writing my second book, Dog Walk Talk. Within ten months of the wreck, I had signed a contract with my publisher for the book—a financial obligation that would last just over a year because the payments were tailored to what I could afford. As I looked back over that whole scenario recently, I was bluntly reminded that bad isn’t always bad, that good can and does come out of bad—perhaps more often than we might think. I am convinced that God had His plan for me, and it wasn’t for me to own that car. His plan was for me to write that book and afford to get it published. I messed with His plan when I over-extended myself to buy that car. He took care of that!  I am humbly thankful for that wreck. I am very grateful for the fact that the book will be released in a short while. I can almost hear Him when I bought that car— “Don’t do it Joe, I have other plans for you”. Bad isn’t always bad.