Imagine driving on a major US interstate.  You begin to notice a car staying exactly beside you for a while and look over to see the front passenger holding up two small duffle bags and pointing at you and your husband.  Where does your mind take you?  Think for a brief moment of everything in today’s world that runs through our minds in this scenario in just one second.  Did you go to all those negative possibilities?  My own does until I recall this exact incident from one of our travels.  But since it was not in our current era of senseless and scary things on the roadways, it was not negative at all.  

Back in 1992 we were  traveling through Oklahoma and Arkansas and into Tennessee in one day.   Our girls were only seven, seven, and three at the time.  We had just entered Arkansas when a car was noticeably staying right beside us to our left on the interstate.  When I looked carefully, the woman in the front passenger seat was holding up two small duffle bags, one blue and one pink, each one covered in Sesame Street characters.  I quickly recognized them as our daughters’ shoe bags for the trip.  The woman kept pointing to our roof so we pulled over as she and her husband pulled off behind us. As we looked on our roof we noticed the old vinyl luggage carrier had torn open at the zipper and had a gaping hole.  

The woman explained that the two bags fell out a few miles back and she and her husband stopped and picked them up.  She realized they had to belong to small kids and since they saw which car they fell from, they caught up with us, got our attention, and returned them.  We were so thankful as all the extra pairs of shoes we had for them were in those bags.  In those days our budget would not have allowed us to replace them in a timely manner. The couple’s simple act of kindness  seems to be more of a rare occurrence in today’s world. What a wonderful day of travel mercies that was!  

I think of another young family that experienced wonderful travel mercies many years ago.  During this past Christmas season our Sunday School Class learned to look at Jesus’ birth through the “eyes” of various people in his birth story.  While details are truly very minimal in the Bible, these lessons gave us different perspectives and thoughts to consider.  Imagine traveling for days while near your due date, on a donkey no less!  Imagine arriving in a small village where many, many others have also journeyed to. Imagine needing a comfortable and safe place to give birth to your firstborn child. Imagine the wonderful travel mercies they were given when someone allowed them to use the area where livestock ate. Imagine being one of the few to see the newborn Savior soon after his arrival. Imagine being able to tell others to go and see this newborn Savior! A day full of mercies – not just for Mary and Joseph – but for those who know Jesus as their personal Savior, Friend and Lord.   

 You can read about the birth of Jesus in Luke 2:4-18