The Greatest Auto Mechanic

I’ve driven a certain Jeep Cherokee for the last seven years. Someone else (supposedly the dealer’s son) drove it for 10 years before that. My car, though I call her classic, is just plain old. About four years ago she started to show her age. She needed a new alternator, a catalytic converter – one time the harmonic balancer, a five-pound piece of metal, just fell off. Clang. It got to the point that I would not feel comfortable driving anywhere over three hours away; she didn’t do well over three hours.

Then I got optimistic. A friend and I wanted to go camping. He drove a little sports coupe at the time and we all know that you don’t go camping in a sports coupe. We took the Jeep. I have to hand it to her, she did well driving north to the Sierras. It’s a long way up that 395 and she chugged through it. Then we turned off and headed up the mountain. Soon something was wrong. She wasn’t idling right, she wanted to cut out. We got to the campsite, turned her off and I decided not to worry about it for a week. We were camping.

After a wonderful few nights in the mountains we headed back down the hill. Something was definitely wrong. Anytime that my foot wasn’t on the gas she would die. To brake I had to shift her into neutral, keep my foot on the accelerator and hit the brake. It was an interesting style of driving.

I asked the mechanic in the nearest town if it was something easy – a busted hose, a lose gasket, anything. It wasn’t.

I drove her all the way back to L.A. in her limping, wounded state. My mechanics patched her up, but she would never be the same. To this day she dies if I don’t give her the right amount of gas in first. And she’s an automatic.

But that being said, she hasn’t had a problem in two years.

There was a year or so where I was dumping a few hundred dollars a month into her to keep her running. Soon I was broke and had little faith in my car to get me anywhere. It’s amazing how much trust we put in our cars. We are very, very dependent.

Finally, at the end of my rope, or exhaust system as it may be, I broke down and prayed to God. I told Him that I needed a car; that I wanted to do things for Him and myself that required transportation. I told Him that I couldn’t afford a new car. I asked that He either keep my car running or provide some new means of transport.

Since then it’s just been brakes and oil. Praise God! Not only for His faithfulness, which is what I now trust rather than my car. But also for his aptitude under the hood.