“ Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, give thanks in all circumstances, for this is the will of God, in Christ Jesus for you.” I Thessalonians 5:16-18
I have never wanted to be a truckdriver. My dad delivered milk house-to-house for 20 years in a very small Divco truck. It was interesting to work on truck with him, but I had no desire to do that for a living. I do not enjoy driving, especially in snow. I did not get my driver’s license until I was 23, right before I got married. I have only my G license , so there is no threat of me getting behind the wheel of an 18-wheeler.
So, from a distance, I admire truck drivers. They maneuver that large piece of steel and wheels into small places . When I was pastor at Floradale, I went with a driver to deliver sawdust to farmers. In the farmyards, there are fences, feed bins, sharp turns to get around to put the sawdust in the right place. This driver never hit anything. Then, there are the long distance truck drivers that go all over North America, dropping off freight and picking up other freight, for on the way back home. There are many pressures on this kind of job. They have to be on time, and yet cannot drive over a certain numbers of hours in a day. They have to wait to be unloaded , and time is money on the road. It must be stressful to be a driver, and his/her family being gone for long hours. Then, all those unsafe drivers on the road, and you have to evade bicyclists in downtown Toronto. So, I invite you to pray for truck drivers and their families, because there are a lot of them in Canada ( over 300, 000 ).
I work for Mennonite Central Committee. By the generous donations of many people , we are able to send material aid to places of war, famine and disasters. We have used over 40 million dollars worth of aid to respond to the crisis in Syria and the surrounding countries that have all those refugees. We work in Congo, Nepal, and Nigeria who have needed emergency aid in order for their citizens to survive. And always the aid is trucked into these dangerous places. They drive between warring factions. They drive through areas hit by earthquakes. They also drive to places, and wait for the material aid to be released by governments. In many cases they are accompanied by military , so the aid will get to where it is needed most. I think it a dangerous occupation to be a truck driver in some countries in the world. There is a road that goes from Syria to Iraq. It is a drive through the desert. According to Google maps that it takes more than nine hours. Trucks went along this route during the Iraq war, and still travel this road with supplies. I have heard that it is safer at night, because people cannot see you coming. There has been danger from robbers and from airstrikes during the war. And yet, truck drivers drive it everyday with aid that is needed.
Pray without ceasing for our truckdrivers of this world, and their families.
Ponder Anew 