My eyes are ever on the Lord, for only He will release my feet from the snare. —Psalm 25:15
Riding a rented bicycle with marginal brakes into a four-way intersection on an unsurfaced road is no game for the fainthearted—and I am fainthearted. But while on a trip to Vietnam, that is exactly the situation in which I was horrified to find myself. There are few motorcars in Hanoi and almost no public transportation, but there are hundreds of thousands of bicycles and small motorcycles racing around the city, guided by no apparent rules.
Taking a deep breath, I plunged into a dense and fast-moving morass of vehicles, all going in different directions, many with multiple passengers and alarming amounts of merchandise. “Please, God,” I gasped, “get me out of this alive.”
Then I noticed the other bicycle riders kept his or her eyes glued to the four- or five-foot swath of road right in front of them. There was much swerving and weaving, but clearly you only had to take evasive action if another rider intruded into that space in front of you.
I’m a quick study in a tight situation. Eyes front, I told myself, and with one or two close calls I got across intersections without bodily harm for the next two weeks and, more important, without a trace of the ghastly sense of panic I had experienced that first day. God didn’t help me escape; God helped me to see order in the midst of chaos.
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