“Lord, don’t listen to these people! They are crazy. I am not thankful we are broken down. I want to get to the retreat.”

I’d joined two sorority sisters on a trip to Gatlinburg, Tennessee for a Christian conference for college students. The dilapidated school bus our group rode began to sputter and wheeze when we hit the mountains. With each breakdown, one by one various students offered prayers, “Lord, thank You for this situation. We trust You to bring good from it.”

I gave thanks for good things—not for things that broke when you needed them to work. This group’s prayers of thanksgiving during the first couple of breakdowns had fascinated me. But now I shivered, and my toes ached with cold. In the back of the bus, my silent prayers took a different tone.Continue Reading