A testimony of divine protection

One night, I was driving home from a worship team meeting at church and it was around 9pm. As I was driving, I noticed that the motorway route I usually take home had a sign of diversion so I was forced to go down a different route along country roads. I began to get really nervous as firstly, I hate country roads (they are notoriously poorly-lit and it always feels like the lanes are too narrow) and secondly because the last time I was diverted from my usual motorway route, the Sat Nav stopped working and I found myself stranded on a different motorway! On that occasion, I had to pull up on the hard-shoulder and wait for my husband to come and drive me home after getting a cab to my location, which I managed to send him on WhatsApp! Naturally, my mind flashed back to that situation and I began to panic but I decided to take a deep breath and follow the diversion signs.

As I did, I found myself being taken down many more country roads. It was also extremely dark so it was very hard to even attempt to recognize my surroundings and the location signs became more and more unfamiliar! I found an increasing sense of dread rising up inside me. I also noticed that a 20-minute journey that I usually would have taken to get home, was becoming more than an hour long!

I managed to stop in a safe place and set up the Sat Nav to see if it would be able to take me home. As I took an exit on the motorway as it instructed, I found myself driving up a very bumpy uneven road. I felt the Holy Spirit tell me slow down and thank God I did, because had I not, I would have driven straight into a large metal fence! I was on farmland!

By this time, I was in full-blown panic-mode; I had no idea where I was, my phone was at less than 5% and I knew that any call that I attempted to make to my husband would be cut off and cause him to panic too as I would have no way of continuing the conversation. By this time it was 11pm and the gravity of my situation began to dawn me. I began to wonder if I should find a place to park until it was daylight but then realized how dangerous this would be as a lone woman in an unfamiliar place at that time of the night. At this point, I was physically shaking with fear but I began to I pray about what to do and I felt the Holy Spirit tell me to slowly reverse and look for a house nearby to ask for help.

I managed to calm my nerves enough to reverse the car and spotted a gated house to park in front of. I cautiously rang the buzzer and for a while, the buzzer rung and rung with no reply. Eventually an elderly woman emerged from a house on the site and asked me what the matter was. She called who I believe was her son from another large house next to hers and I told him where I needed to get to. He gave me directions but as I was in such a state and physically shaking, I couldn’t process what he was telling me, so much so that when I tried to reverse the car to leave, I ended up reversing onto his lawn from the driveway! His wife came out from the house and saw that I was visibly distressed and shaking so told me to come in and sit down.

By now, my phone was completely dead so she said she would charge my phone for me and help get me home. I was so overcome with emotion that I found myself bursting into tears, I couldn’t believe the situation I had found myself in! I also begun to wonder what my husband might be thinking at home with our toddler when I should have been home hours ago!

The couple had three teenage children who were staring at me in the kitchen as my phone charged but after seeing how upset I was, engaged me in friendly conversation. I felt really silly when I tried to explain what had happened but they were extremely warm and friendly. They allowed my phone to charge enough for me to call my husband and then wrote down directions for me to get home. I also set up the Sat Nav alongside the written instructions I had been given.

As I was still a bit shaky, the man asked his daughters to drive ahead of me in their own car to direct me to the motorway so they could be more confident that I could get home. As foolish as I felt about the predicament I had found myself in, I was in awe of how God had stepped in to keep me safe through the kindness of strangers who were so willing to help, so late at night!

When I finally got home, it was around half-past twelve. I managed to text the teenager who had driven ahead of me to help me get home (as she had given me her number before driving).

When I got home and checked my Sat Nav for past destinations, I realized that the Sat Nav hadn’t been set to take me home at all but to a completely different location which explained how I ended up on farmland!

I learnt a lot of lessons from that experience, including making sure I had an in-car charger for my phone at all times and double-checking the settings on the Sat Nav before setting off on a journey! Most of all, it was a reminder of the goodness of God. All manner of things could have happened to me that night: I could have, in my panic, had an accident on one of those many country roads, I could have crashed into that metal fence or even have been completely stranded if there had been no one in those houses that night or if they had been fast asleep!

A year later, I was promoted at work with a leadership role (a role I wasn’t even going to apply for but was encouraged to by my manager) and was attending leadership courses. The location of the course centre turned out to be within a two-minute drive from the farmland where I had been lost and I passed it on the route! Every time I drove to the course centre and I passed the farm, it was a reminder of the faithfulness and protection of God! The place of panic and fear had become a place of testimony and also promotion! God is good!