It was a weekend to remember, the second in a row for me. A weekend whose chief feature was that what I expected was almost never what actually happened.

The plan was to visit my brother in Iowa, because my niece and nephew-in-law, missionaries in China, are home on a short leave. The original plan was for me to ride down with another family member who was coming from further north.

But he had car trouble, and had to cancel. So I loaded up Mrs. Hermanson and turned her nose south.

In northern Iowa, near Mason City, she lost power (though the engine continued running). I pulled her over to the shoulder, and phoned AAA.

AAA sent a tow truck. The driver took me, not to nearby Mason City, but to Albert Lea, Minnesota (yes, we have a town called Albert Lea. It was named after a Minnesota pioneer who didn’t want to be confused with his brother). That was about a half hour tow. The problem, I learned there, was the clutch.

My brother drove up and collected me later that evening. The next morning the repair shop called to tell me fixing the clutch would cost $1000 to $1100.

Well, Mrs. Hermanson and I have shared a lot of miles, but dumping a thousand bucks into her isn’t something I’m going to do at this point in history. So I called my former boss in Minneapolis. In addition to being an ordained minister and a department head with our church body, he’s a licensed car dealer (in our church you need a sideline or two if you want to make a living). He’s also an A type and not one of life’s spectators. My intention was to ask him to start looking for a new car for me. He told me he’d check a couple things and get back to me.

When he called back, he said he’d talked to “his” mechanic, who thought he could do the job for considerably less. So I authorized him to borrow a pickup, rent a tow bar, and meet me the next day at the shop in Albert Lea.

My brother drove me up to Albert Lea (minimal cost; he drives a vegetable oil-fueled diesel car), and we hitched Mrs. Hermanson up and took off.

It was a long drive. It was a couple hours to the cities, and the mechanic is about an hour and a half further north.

But we had a good time together, something we haven’t done for a while. And one thing happened that convinced my benefactor that it was God’s will we be together at just that time.

Long ago, just when I first went to work for him, we were involved in a complicated, contentious, and difficult problem. It involved a lot of overtime for both of us (but mostly for him). It involved a lot of trouble and travel and jumping through legal hoops. It was a highly sensitive business, and easily susceptible to misunderstanding. He made few friends, and lost some, in the course of it.

Through it all I watched him agonize over the right way to handle things. He took great pains to make every step he took ethical, moral, and Scriptural. For this he got very little credit.

During the trip, he got a phone call. The call informed him that after all these years, he’d gotten some vindication in the matter.

He said to me, “You know, there’s almost nobody left at headquarters who even remembers those days, who knows this story. You’re about the only one left, and here you are with me today.”

That’s what we Christians call a divine appointment.