January 2008
Reflections - "Epiphany - Expecting Something Good to Happen"
Waiting for something bad to happen. The whole time I was in Egypt, I was on edge, awake, alert, ready, because I believed at any moment something bad was going to happen. And interestingly enough it was at the very moment that I was trying to leave Egypt that something extraordinary, something unexpected, something at great risk did happen. Like a thief unexpectedly breaking into my house, a Cairo cab driver at 3:00 AM came out of nowhere and stood before me asking if I needed a ride. It took place in Cairo’s Domestic Airport where I had just arrived on my Egypt Air Flight two hours late. My next flight was to leave at 3:30 AM from Cairo’s International Airport instead of the Domestic Airport where I stood, waiting for my suitcase to show up on the carousel.
Upon hearing of my dilemma the airport manager told me to leave my suitcase behind, and get a cab or airport bus to transport me to Cairo’s International Airport fifteen minutes away. I raced through the terminal like an old O.J. Simpson Hertz Rent-A-Car commercial looking for help. And now in front of me was the assistance I needed. I told the cabbie that I only had 50 Egyptian pounds (which is worth roughly $6) and that I needed to make a 3:30 flight. "No problem, come, come quickly,:" he shouted as we ran together. When we came to his car, I noticed that it was a small run down vehicle with no mention of being a cab on it. As he struggled to get the engine engaged, I had my first of many doubts that maybe this wasn’t really the best situation for me to be in. Nevertheless the driver got the car going and we did some creative driving to get out of the parking lot. We then stopped at not one but two toll booths. I gave the cabbie the only money I had. "Too much" he shoved it back. "This is the only money I have" I responded. The cabbie became very agitated and disgustedly took my 50 Egyptian pound note. As we drove away from the toll station onto an expressway he began to vent, "This is all the money you have. You need more money, more money. This is a cab. I need to be paid."
Luckily he continued to drive, doing a kind of a Jekyll and Hyde impersonation saying to himself and to me loudly, "That’s O.K. It’ll work out! It’ll work out!" We drove on an expressway in the dark of early morning and I wondered if I would be dropped in the middle of nowhere, or perhaps in the Valley of the Dead cemetery in Cairo that I had seen upon my arrival in Egypt. But the cabbie true to his word took me to the International Airport. When he stopped he excitedly shouted "Money, money, I need money. I take you to Airport, you need to pay." I gave him my few remaining Egyptian bills. "Not enough. Not enough." I thought of running, but I wasn’t sure that I might be shot in my back if I did that. So I reached into my traveler’s pouch and pulled out a travelers check. "This is your lucky day" I told him, "You have helped me. This is a check that you can cash that is worth a lot of money." The driver was suspicious. After I finished writing my signature I gave it to him. "Take it, sign your name here. Thank you." And off I ran at 3:20 AM to the terminal door to try to make my plane at 3:30 AM.
What happened during my time of absolute vulnerability in Egypt was an extraordinary thing that turned out for me not to be bad, but to be something unexpectedly good. Not only did I get to the airport, I made my flight to Paris. When I arrived in Paris, I realized all of the information about my transfer - the hotel where I would be staying, the gate where I would rendezvous with Lani - was in my suitcase. A friendly Parisian information center employee who spoke English showed me how to get a telephone card, gave me the phone number of the hotel where I thought I’d be staying, as well as the phone number of Egypt Air to tell them to send my suitcase (no doubt going around in circles in Cairo’s Domestic Airport’s luggage carousel) to Paris.
I called the hotel, was told Lani’s plane was delayed, and was given the gate number where a bus would be waiting for me. Picked up at the airport, I was taken to the Paris hotel where I’d be staying, was told where to get lunch and perhaps purchase some clothes in anticipation that I wouldn’t get my suitcase right away. I purchased three stylish used shirts from the local 5 & Dime Store which came in handy as it took over a week for my suitcase to arrive in France. My suitcase retrieval hero was Dr. Rabia, my pilgrimage coordinator who lives in Cairo, who went to the airport after I emailed him, claimed my bag and had it sent by Air France to Montpelier where I was staying. When I received my luggage it was fully intact, just the way I had left it. My traveling group applauded my lost suitcase’s arrival. The lost had been found and reunited with its home, thanks to kind, thoughtful, generous, Egyptian people who went out of their way to help a lost helpless soul a long way from home.
Waiting for something bad to happen. When Lani and I were engaged on July 31, 1976 we were so excited about our commitment to each other. We planned our wedding date to be on Saturday, December 18, 1976, only five months away because it would be right during Christmas break between my two senior semesters at General Seminary. As we prepared for our wedding date both of us began to feel a sense of dread, but not that we were going to marry each other. Rather a feeling that something so wonderful had happened for both of us, that we were afraid something bad would happen to upset the apple cart of our profound joy. We were invited by our wise pre-marital counselor and friend, Dick Lehman to (1) realize that our feelings were normal and (2) to change our focus from, surely we don’t deserve to have something wonderful happened to us, to something is going to take place that is a major blessing because God loves us. In other words to wait for something good to happen.
The central message of Epiphany is that the light of God’s Glory shines for everyone. God is not just the light at the end of a dark tunnel for us. God is in the dark tunnel with us. God is with us in the hard times of life. God doesn’t just suddenly show up when things get better. God is in the darkness. Christ comes at the end of time absolutely. But Christ also comes NOW, bearing in his flesh the scars from whips, and nail holes in hands and feet. He will take us by the hand and walk with us through our shadow-lands and into such a bright dawn as we cannot even imagine. And so in Epiphany we step out in hope. Waiting not for something bad to happen. Rather expecting for something extraordinarily good to happen, because God loves you, me, all people. Happy Epiphany!
