April 13, 2007
by Police Chaplain Paul Northcut
It was a beautiful spring day. I was visiting the folks at City Hall in London, Arkansas, when I received a message on my pager. I was asked to respond to the Flying J Truck Stop and meet with a truck driver who was despondent and talking about suicide. His name was Pete (not his real name), a long distance truck driver from Tennessee. He told me his story.
A few days ago, his wife told him she had enough of his being on the road and she was leaving him. He wasn’t even sure how he got to Russellville. He just started driving and found himself here. In the truck stop, he overheard two people talking. One of them said to the other, “you need to pray.” But Pete thought, “I don’t know how to pray or even who to pray to.” Through an amazing series of events that only God could arrange, Pete found himself sitting at a table with another Christian brother and myself.
For over an hour, we sat together and drank coffee. We let Pete tell his story and listened carefully as he recounted his life. After he finished it was our turn (you have to earn the right to be heard). We shared with him about God’s love and grace and His wonderful plan of salvation. Pete was as “dumb as a rock” when came to the Bible so we started at the beginning. I got a New Testament out of my car and gave it to him. I walked him through the story of Nicodemus in John 3 and down the Romans Road underlining key verses. We wound up at Revelation 3:20 where Jesus says, “Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in . . .” I asked Pete if he wanted to open his heart to the Lord Jesus. He said he did.
So sitting there in the truck stop, Pete became a new person in Christ. When we stopped praying, I asked Pete how he felt. “The load is gone, I feel like a new man,” was his answer. The first thing he did was to go looking for someone to tell what had happened to him. What a testimony he gave! It is always exciting to see someone born into the family of God. I shared several more pieces of literature with him and more words of encouragement and instructions before we went our separate ways. We asked him to keep in touch and gave him our phone number and addresses. About a week later, we got word that he was still excited about Jesus. So much so that the man he drove with had refused to have him as his partner. Where is Pete now? Somewhere on the Glory road! Praise the Lord.