What a Canoe Race Taught Me About God

An important life lesson learned three decades later...

When I was in high school, I decided to build my own canoe so I could enter the annual Mid-American Canoe Race. The course ran on the river just a few blocks from our house, so I knew I just had to enter!

I started to buy materials as my budget would allow, building it piece by piece in my dad’s garage. It took two years to complete as I needed most of my money for college. Eventually, it was finished, and I took it out on its maiden voyage. It went perfectly! Encouraged, I recruited my college girlfriend in the mixed team category as my race partner.

One feature of the race was portaging around dams, so a few weeks before the race, we went out to practice portaging on the same river. After an afternoon of practice, I decided to quit for the day and put the canoe back up on the roof rack of my dad’s new Buick. I asked her to get in the car and back it closer to the river’s edge to make it easier. But while doing that, she went too far, panicked, and hit the gas instead of the brake. Into the river went the car, with the rear half sinking up to its frame in the muck. I had to call a tow truck to get it out.

Once I got the canoe back on the roof rack, we headed to the nearest car wash. After pumping a handful of quarters into the thing, the white car was again spotless! I went home and acted as if nothing had happened... not saying a word to anyone. I also swore my girlfriend to silence as well.

But that was not the end of the story...

One summer afternoon (about thirty years later), I was sitting out front with my dad. We were having a sweet tea and watching the storm clouds that were beginning to gather. For some unexplained reason, I decided to tell him what had happened with the car all those years ago. When I was finished, he said to me... “Thanks for telling me. But I knew all along that something like that happened.” Amazed, I asked how he could have possibly known since I did such an excellent job of washing the car.

He said, “I’d taken the car in for an oil change. The mechanic pointed out a large amount of dried mud on top of the frame under the car. He suggested that it be cleaned off to prevent rust from developing every time the car was driven in the rain.”

It was a stunning life lesson for me... God knows who we are and what we have done in life, but He is patient with us, waiting for us to come to Him, repent of our sins, and make Him the Lord of our lives. I presented a clean white car on the outside but dirty on the inside. But unlike my dad, who did not punish me for the mud on the car frame, there will be a time of judgment for each of us when we die. We all have time today to go to God, confess our sins, and turn from them. But if we won’t or don’t ever do that, and our time runs out... we will be judged... and our non-negotiable penalty will stand for all eternity. We can do nothing to clean ourselves up perfectly enough or hide our sins well enough to escape this reality. Our only hope is to accept God’s free gift of salvation by His grace through faith alone in Jesus Christ’s atonement for our sins… and not by anything we can ever do on our own.

As it turns out, I never competed in that canoe race. A combination of bad weather, work, and school prevented that from happening. But what I learned from it was far more valuable than a race trophy could ever be!

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