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It’s a Sunday at 1:30 in the afternoon, and I’m sitting in bed in my pajamas. I visited Bedside Baptist Church this morning, and I am not ashamed.

I am ashamed, however, that my busyness made me completely forget that Father’s Day is today. I tried to make up for it by a really good prayer at lunch but it felt vastly insufficient. Daughter fail.

Yesterday I drove the awful route back from Lemars, Iowa. Normally driving for two hours through the Midwest is torture enough.

Whitney, you know you have to take another route, a longer route, home because of the flooding.

Oh.

So my good father printed me out directions with maps for every exit and merge. He explained the route to me twice before I left.

It will take a lot longer, but it’s the best way.

I remember asking him if I could go a different way that was faster. Someone told me that I could do it that way.

Whitney, I guess you can do whatever you want. But the way I told you is the best way, I know it is.

I sighed and drove on the highway, mad at myself that I forgot to bring CDs. I missed my first real exit, and realized I actually needed to pay attention to dad’s map. I didn’t know where I was going. Shocker.

The four-lane highway gradually turned into two-lane. And before I knew it, I was going 30 miles per hour on a one-lane construction road as Keith Green told me that God put this love in his heart. Are you kidding? I should have gone my own way, this is ridiculous. And as each junction approached, a tempting urge to take a different highway whispered in my ear.

The way I told you is the best way, I know it is.

After the construction zones ended and the speeding fines were no longer doubled, I found myself behind a semi that didn’t like to be followed too closely as it would spew rocks at any car within 50 feet of it.

I am going to pass you, dumb semi.

But every time the middle line was dotted, cars were always coming the opposite way. It was like they were waiting for when I was legally allowed to pass to taunt me. Funny.

I thought I saw a big enough break in traffic to pass the rock-spewing semi and bolted for it. I was caught up with the semi’s middle wheels when I realized I was playing chicken with a car headed right for me. I hit the brakes and got back into my lane.

I just can’t even cheat the system, can I?

And junctions came and went. Highway 30 sounds like it would take me to Omaha, wouldn’t it? Or maybe that highway…yeah, Highway 34? That sounds familiar…

Whitney, don’t waste your time.

So I followed my dad’s map & finally made it home. And no, I don’t have one of those “if I had taken this highway, a van full of thugs would have poked holes in my tires, stolen my stuff, & raped me” stories. Honestly, I’m still not sure that way was the best way. Sometimes I wonder if I could have made it home faster if I went another way.

But I did what he told me to. Because I love him. And I trust him. Take the parallels as you wish.

And Keith Green isn’t that bad.

Happy Father’s Day, dad.