CEMENT BLOCK AND THE CHRISTIAN'S LIFE

(This story is written by BletJaw, and is submitted to you all with love and prayers.  He asks that if possible could you pray for us in this work, not only for the health and conversion of the people we serve, but for our safety on these deplorable, life threatening roads that we must travel day after day, and other constant dangers. Words just cannot describe it all.   Our lives are hanging in the balance so many times).We need cement block for making a wall in front of our house. It is to keep the loose dirt from washing away during the rainy season. We can buy cement blocks from two places – MeDooGlow or Meta. MeDooGlow side is closer. It is only one and a half hours away. It is not dangerous, and the road is not so bad, but, the cement block is a poor quality. Meta side is far away, the road is very steep and very bad, plus it can be very dangerous, but the cement block is a good quality. Which cement block do we want for the important wall? The wall needs to be strong. .The rainy season is just about to start. It has rained several times already, but we begin driving with nice weather and everything is good. We had been told by the villagers that wild elephants are out somewhere on our way to Meta. We had a patient from another village that wanted us to take them back to their village, so we took them and continued on our journey. We had to go through the mountains – up and down. Some places are dense jungle areas. The road goes in and out of the jungle. Almost halfway to Meta we saw fresh elephant tracks on the road. That elephant might be ahead of us! We were alert and continued carefully.  Soon we saw fresh elephant dung and heard the elephant’s loud trumpeting sound. I slowed down the truck as I turned the next corner. There - right in front of us where the elephant sound had came from, were 2 elephants, one off the left side of the road and the other one right on the road where we needed to go through! We were very close to the elephants because they were at a blind corner. I felt like my heart beat went up to a thousand beats per minute! I backed the truck up around the corner and waited some distance away for a few minutes. We prayed to God for help, and then drove around the corner again. I drove really slow in that corner – there they were still on the road looking toward us! OH NO!!!   My heartbeat went up again to 1000 beats per minute! I backed up the truck again. We waited for several more minutes. After a long time we ventured around the corner for the third time. I drove the truck very slowly. We did not hear anything. This time, however we saw 3 elephants, one in the middle of the road, one off to the left and another off to the right. Once again my heart beat went up to over 1000 beats per minute! I backed up the truck again. We can do nothing – only wait. We were not going to give up easily. We wanted to go forward and get good cement block, because we really need it. Finally we decided to try to get around that corner the fourth time. I started the truck and drove slowly to the corner. This time we saw four elephants. Three were going up the bank on the left side of the road, and one more elephant was following them. They were making loud trumpeting sounds. We would not dare to go through that corner any farther, because we did not know if there were more elephants on the other side of the corner. What made us even more scared was seeing another bigger elephant standing on the right side of the road! Now we see 4 on the left and one on the right. We were looking at five large elephants in all!  Once again my heartbeat went up to over 1000 beats per minute. I have to back up the truck again. Until this point, we had not given up the plan to go ahead and buy the much needed good quality cement block. Because we need it quickly before it really rains hard day and night.We saw one of the big elephants coming toward us. She stopped at the beginning of the corner, and started to play with a small tree branch, she then threw dirt on her back with her trunk. We had been waiting and watching for a long time. Later her son came and played with her. Now the two of them were on the road playing and slowly coming toward us. The little one has chains tying both front feet together. Later we found out that he has chains on his feet because he likes to chase people! Even though he has chains on his feet, he can jump pretty fast! They both have bells around their necks, so we are pretty sure they are tame elephants and have owners. Now we see another traveler coming up behind us on a motorbike. He stopped and we told him about the elephants. He turned around and stopped his motorbike heading away from the elephants. He began walking toward the elephants, throwing rocks and yelling at them. The man kept throwing rocks at the elephants, hoping and wishing the elephants would be scared of him and run away. Instead of running away, the little one went back to the corner and made a loud trumpeting sound that seemed like a call for help. Immediately from the other side of the corner we heard a scary sound, and here came the biggest elephant that I ever saw in my life! The man told us that three of these elephants are tame and two are wild. We have heard stories about the wild elephants chasing people. We even saw a man who had been chased by an elephant. We also heard about a wild elephant destroying a motorbike, and killing a mother her child.At this point we have to turn around, but we did not give up to get good quality cement block because we really needed it. We decided to go another long long way. Part of this way we had never traveled before so we have no idea how far and how bad the road would be. We had to go through 5 villages in order to reach highway 105 which takes us to Meta where the good quality cement block was.It is hard to describe how bad the roads are here in Thailand. We passed two villages that we had never been to before. The road was terrible. It was not a busy road because trucks do not usually go there.  It was OK for a motorbike, but NOT for a truck. There were several steep sharp corners going straight up and then straight down. Also there were four places uphill that you must not make any mistakes on or have any engine problems. One up-hill we barely made to the top. It was really hard because it was so steep with loose rock, gravel and sand. The wheels were spinning, the engine roaring and only my angel helped me make it. As soon as we made it safely to the top, I praised God for sending the angels once again to help us. Even though I started my driving experience in the mountains, I told Breck, “Definitely I will not come back this way with cement block.”Finally we arrived at Meta at 4:30 p.m. We had left BYT at 9 a.m. Normally it would take us three and half hours to get to Meta on a good day! Today it took us over 7 hours! But it is well worth it to get good quality cement block. By the time we arrived in Meta we were starving hungry, but we had no time to eat because in 30 minutes the cement shop would close. Already the gates were half shut to the parking area. We rushed in to buy the cement block. After that we bought water and a small snack for our stomachs. We had no time to relax and eat our snacks because it was late and already it was raining in some places.Finally we headed out to BYT. Up in mountains the higher we got the harder it was to see ahead of us because we were in the midst of the clouds. Carefully I drove through the roads where often the wild elephants are seen. We were so thankful to God that we did not see the elephants in the first dangerous area. By this time the sun was down, and the sky was getting dark. We came to a place where we had to make another decision. The first choice was to go the shortcut way. It will take us to BYT in 35 minutes, but the road is narrow and very steep. There are dangerous down hills in two places and it was already raining. Because of the rain the slippery mud can do you crazy, sending your brakes and steering out of control. I have experienced this once before when the truck took us just one foot from the precipice. The Lord has often saved me from Satan’s hand and I praise Him for that.The second choice was to go the long way around which would take us 2 more hours to get to BYT, and let’s not forget that was the same road where we had met the elephants earlier in the day.It is late, raining a little, and getting very dark, so we have a hard decision to make.We decided to take the first choice and started rolling the truck wheels down the mountain shortcut. The longer we drove the wetter the ground was getting. Soon enough we were at the top of the first very steep downhill. Before going on down, I stopped the truck and went ahead to check the road. Sure enough the road was wet, muddy and slippery. It was not a good idea to even try driving down it. We parked the truck somewhere in jungle and began walking home. We got home very late. It was dark. We were hungry and tired. Yes, but we got home safely! We will get the truck the next day if it is dry.Somehow, our Adventist Christian life is just like this experience in getting good quality cement block. The cement block represents our character. Satan will tell you to go to a closer place, where the road is easy to build your character on, but what you will get is a weak character. To gain the crown from Jesus is just like getting good quality cement block. You may have to go where the path is difficult. There will be dangers, you will be hungry, tired, worn, and tempted to give up at times, but if you are faithful and endure the hard times with Jesus help, you will get a good quality strong character that will stand the test of trials and temptations. God is so faithful. He will never let you face temptations that you cannot bear. He will show you the way and how to escape the dangers, so together with Jesus let us make the decision to build good quality strong characters today.