THE BACKWARDS VIEW

When our year-old car was destroyed in an accident, I had one “must” for our replacement: a back-up camera. Maybe it's an older, careful-driver thing, but I felt it would help with parallel parking or backing out of a shopping mall parking space.

That gadget, however, wouldn't have prevented the accident caused by an inexperienced driver. We'd just visited a friend in the hospital and were driving home in a car we'd bought just a year earlier. About a mile into our journey, headed up a narrow hillside road, we noticed a vehicle careen at high speed around a bend and weave erratically, headed for us. In those panicked seconds, my husband pulled to the narrow shoulder as far as possible. There was no guardrail to stop an over-the-ledge push if the other driver slammed into us. Instead, he struck us with a glancing blow that destroyed the side of our car. Miraculously (God-protected-ly), we didn't tumble down the embankment to serious injury or perhaps death.

Nobody was hurt seriously, though “shaken.” Police came quickly, the wrecked cars were towed, and we called a friend to take us home. Then we faced the insurance labyrinth and finding another car. That should have tied up the loose ends of that scary experience, right? Maybe, except that we exert influence we may not be aware of. Months later, my husband was shopping one day when a woman came up to him. Her son was the one who hit us. She thanked my husband for his caring attitude toward her son, in running to his wrecked car to make sure he was okay.

I thought of that scenario when I came across this head-scratch-er (for me) quote by Marshall McLuhan, a Canadian philosopher on media theory: “We look at the present through a rear-view mirror. We march backwards into the future.” One interpretation: how we act in emergencies and trauma spreads a long shadow forward.

About fifteen years earlier, we survived another “totaled” wreck nearly 200 miles from home when another driver (impaired by alcohol) also took a corner too fast and lost control. That time, our family suffered injuries. But I took my experience to the public, speaking for nearly a decade at monthly “alcohol education” meetings required of people convicted with “driving under the influence.” Eventually, I needed to end looking in the historical “rear-view” mirror. But from the number who came up to express appreciation for honest sharing, I know it was the right thing to do.

I think that's true of any experience we endure and reflect on with angst or sorrow. Eventually, with God's help, we need to move on. Contemporary author Ann Voskamp put this spin on it: “God reveals Himself in rear-view mirrors. And I've an inkling that there are times when we need to drive a long, long distance before we can look back and see God's back in the rear view mirror. Maybe sometimes about as far as heaven—that kind of distance.”

The apostle Paul, of course, didn't have any experience with auto wrecks. But he did endure imprisonment, beatings, stonings, shipwrecks, malicious talk and other things that would make an ordinary person ask, “Where is God in all this?” Instead of dwelling on hurting things that were “behind,” he urged this attitude:

Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus. (Philippians 3:13b-14)

(1)Quote by Marshall McLuhan: “We look at the present through a rear view mirr...” (goodreads.com)

(2)Quote by Ann Voskamp: “God reveals Himself in rearview mirrors. And I'...” (goodreads.com)