Boy, Are You Lucky!

People may ask me why I believe in God, and one of my replies may be that I have experienced things for which I cannot find a reason, other than supernatural intervention. Take the following experience as an example.

Many years ago, while I was enrolled in college, I would work during the summers for a construction company, which performed excavating and ground work. As part of the training and duties we college students received, we were often allowed and asked to move or operate heavy equipment, such as tractors, rollers, and on-site dump trucks.

On one particular job, there were several pieces of heavy equipment and a few dump trucks scattered around a residential neighborhood in which we were installing a storm drain system. The neighborhood was on the side of a hill and there were several short cross streets that connected other streets that ran perpendicular to the top of the hill.

One day, I was asked to move a dump truck from one of these short cross streets to another part of the job site. At one end of this street, was a tee to another street that went further up the hill, and at the other end of the street, was another tee with a house directly across from it.

I climbed into the cab and started the truck. I shifted into gear to start the climb of the hill. There was a stop sign at the end of the short cross street, and the next street became even steeper. As I brought the truck to a stop and proceeded to turn right up the even steeper road, the truck stalled. I double-checked that I was in low gear, restarted the truck and attempted the turn again. Again, the truck stalled. I knew the truck was capable of making the turn, and thought I must be missing something.

This is where I need to explain the difference in brakes between personal vehicles and commercial/heavy trucks. Personal vehicles use a hydraulic brake system that engages the brakes when the brake pedal is depressed. In heavy trucks, the brake system is operated by air. Air pressure actually holds the brakes in the “off” position until the brake pedal is depressed. The air pressure is then decreased so that the brakes are applied. In other words, it works in the opposite manner of the brakes in a personal vehicle.

After repeated attempts to make the turn and using the brakes to hold the truck in place, the air pressure had diminished to nearly zero. So, I placed the truck in neutral, set the parking break and let off the clutch to see if the brake would hold the truck in place. At that time, I noticed that there was no difference whether I had the parking brake set or not. The parking brake was operated with a pneumatic switch that had no “On” of “Off” designation. So I left the parking brake on, or so I thought.

At that point, I recognized that I needed some assistance, so I decided to leave the truck idling to build up the air pressure. I left the cab and started walking down the hill to find someone to help me. I was several yards away when I heard a tink!. This truck didn’t have a backup beeper, instead it had a gong on one rear wheel. When the truck backed up, a little hammer would drop against the gong: tink! I stopped and listened. Tink! I whipped my head around, and to my horror, the truck was coasting backward toward me! Worse yet, I was envisioning the house at the end of street being certainly flattened! I panicked. I ran back to the truck and grabbed the handle on the cab in an attempt to enter the cab. My hand slipped and fell off the truck. I attempted to get into the truck two more times, but failed both times. By now the truck was travelling faster than I could run. Appalled, all I could do was stand and watch as the truck backed down the hill. My heart sank in despair.

Then, to my utter amazement, I saw the steering wheel start to turn. Was it now going to flatten one of the houses on the cross street? My eyes were now fixed on the steering wheel. As it turned, the truck veered to my right. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. The truck continued turning until it reached an opening in a hedge. At that point the truck made the rest of a ninety-degree turn between the hedges and onto the side lawn of a nearby house where it came to rest.

My jaw dropped, and I stood in awe of what I just witnessed. How was that even possible? If I had been in the truck, I doubt I could have parked it at that speed and into that spot. As I rushed toward the truck, I was almost afraid to look in the cab, fearing that there might be someone there. I pulled the cab door open to find the cab empty.

At that point, I hurried around the corner and found a coworker to help me. As we approached the truck and he saw where it had landed, he asked, “How did you get in there?”

“I didn’t,” I responded. Then I proceeded to tell him the story.

“Wow! Were you lucky!” he exclaimed.

“I know,” I said.

He went on to explain to me what I didn’t know. There was a lever to put the truck in “deep gear reduction.” This allowed the truck to be put into the lowest gear possible than the shifter alone allowed. Once he flipped the lever, the truck easily climbed off from the lawn, up the street, and then around the turn.

The word “lucky” kept resonating in my mind. Being lucky was finding a penny on the sidewalk. What had just happened couldn’t have been luck. Luck couldn’t turn the steering wheel at the right time and at the correct rate to make the truck back between hedges and avoid flattening houses, cars, and heaven forbid, people.

Noah Webster gives this definition for “miracle” in his 1828 American Dictionary of the English Language:

“In theology, an event or effect contrary to the established constitution and course of things, or a deviation from the known laws of nature; a supernatural event. Miracles can be wrought only by Almighty power, as when Christ healed lepers, saying, 'I will, be thou clean, ' or calmed the tempest, 'Peace, be still.'”

That event has remained ingrained in my heart and mind since it happened. To this day, I don’t understand why the truck turned like it did, except that there is a loving God, and for some reason He chose to spare me the effects of that potential tragedy. When you hear someone refer to “Amazing Grace”, it refers to events like this, where God extends His hand into a situation and spares us from consequences untold.