At the telephone operators’ reunion, it always comes up.
“Hey, remember how Lavon pulled out in front of that semi (when we were car-pooling to Tulsa and it was my turn to drive) and she had her cigarette in one hand and her Pepsi between her legs? Everyone screamed. “Gun it, gun it! Lavon, look at his eyes!”
“I don’t have time to look at his eyes,” Lavon yelled back, with a few choice words thrown in.”
That was back in my rebellious days. I wasn’t living for the Lord. I wasn’t doing anything so wrong, unless you want to count smoking and cussing.
We sure had a lot of good times together, those girls and I did, but I had some hard times, too. Sometimes one of them took an extra turn driving because I didn’t have the money for gas or my old worn-out car broke down. There were two in particular that always seem to end up on the same shift that I did, so we almost always rode together, and they had to listen to all my sob stories all the way to Tulsa and back. There were times we all didn’t like each other very well, and sometimes we had our quarrels, but now I can’t remember any.
As I look back now I can see that God put us all together for a reason. Those girls were my support team. Jesus surrounded me with Christian women who could lead me back to Him. They showed me Christian love and never gave up on me.
“A man who has friends must himself be friendly: but there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother.” Proverbs 18:24 NIV
I had one other friend, my Best Friend, during that time that never left my side, even though I wasn’t living a lifestyle befitting a child of God. Jesus was always with me. He had told me He would never leave me or forsake me, that He would go with me to the end.
And when it seemed like the end had come, there Jesus was waiting to welcome me back home into the fold.