“ENTERTAINING  ANGELS”
(PART THREE)

BY: NEAL  MURPHY

“Be not forgetful to entertain strangers; for thereby some have entertained angels unawares.”  ( Hebrews 13:2 )

 

Our daughter, Kay, had recently married and was living in St. Joseph, Missouri.  Our son, Doug, was attending college in the same city.  In the summer of 1980 my wife and I had enjoyed a weekend with them, driving there from our home in Ft. Worth, Texas.

 

Interstate 35W was still busy with traffic, even at 1:00 a.m. on this early Sunday morning as we returned.  About twenty-five miles north of Ft. Worth my 1975 Volkswagen Rabbit suddenly became a turtle, then a snail, and finally died.  I coasted over to the shoulder without power and stopped.  We looked at each other as we pondered our sudden predicament.

 

We had a few options, but none were desirable.  Should we lock the car with our luggage inside, and attempt to find a telephone?  Should I do this alone, or should we both walk?  I really did not want to leave my wife alone in a disabled car on the side of an interstate freeway.

I took inventory of any open convenience stores or gas stations on the feeder road, but nothing was in view.  My wife began to pray for God’s assistance while I opened the hood and peered inside.  I saw nothing dramatic under the hood, however not being a mechanic I was not totally surprised.  A large truck passed by so closely that the wind almost blew me over.  We needed help fast.

 

About that time a man in a pickup truck pulled off on the shoulder ahead of us.  He exited his vehicle and walked back to me, a big smile on his face. “You out of gas?”,  he asked me.  “I don’t think so as my gauge showed about half a tank.  The engine just suddenly stopped as though a switch was flipped”, I reported to him.  “Well, I have a five-gallon tank of gas in the truck bed, let’s put a couple of gallons in there and see what happens.”

 

I did not see any writing on the side of his pick up, and wondered about this Good Samaritan.  Who was he, and what was his game?  I felt that I needed to be on alert in case he was planning something sinister.

 

Then he appeared at the rear of my Rabbit with the gas can.  After putting in a couple of gallons, I attempted to start the car, but it would not co-operate.  “I guess you were right about the gas”, he stated.  “We’ll have to do something else.”  I decided it was time to smoke him out.  “Do you work for AAA, or a towing company?” I asked, watching him closely.  “No, I don’t”, he replied while handing me a business card.  “I am a member of the CB Rescue Club of Fort Worth.  We volunteer to patrol the freeways on week ends looking for people in trouble like yourself.”  That sounded reasonable to me at the time.

 

“Where do you folks live?” he asked.  “Gosh, we live in Wedgwood.  That is a long way southeast of here, maybe fifty miles”, I replied.  “No problem, folks, just grab your luggage and get in the truck and I will drive you home”, he offered.  I hated to leave my Rabbit stranded on the freeway.  It would probably be towed away overnight.  But, his offer seemed the best one on the table under the circumstances.  It was now close to 2 in the morning.

 

He drove us to the driveway of our home.  He seemed like a really nice, pleasant fellow.  We invited him into our home so he could relax a few minutes.  We would not normally have taken that chance, but felt compelled to help him in return.  My wife made some sandwiches, opened some chips and a Coke.  He seemed to be hungry, though he refused to sit on our furniture because “he would get it dirty”.  He admired my Kel Light, a flashlight used by police officers, so I gave it to him.

 

We thanked him for his kind assistance.  He refused any money as payment for his expenses.  He reported that his wife was in the hospital and that he needed to go be with her.  Then he left.  I looked at his business card.  It gave his name along with “Tarrant County CB Rescue Club”, and a telephone number.  

 

My wife thought it would be a nice gesture to call his club the next day and thank them for their help.  However, the phone number was not good.  I tried to locate the man in the telephone book.  We could never locate him or his organization.  The man appeared suddenly, and disappeared mysteriously.  Suppose we had entertained an angel unawares?