Saturday, August 26, 2017

Taxi Rides

“…there will be more joy in the presence of God’s angels when even one sinner repents.” Luke 15:10.

Trips by taxi can be quite interesting! Most of the drivers who are newcomers to our land respond to a friendly passenger and may share happy news or even a felt need during a short ride to my destination.

“Our water buffalo had a female calf!”, exclaimed the taxi driver from India. “We’ll be able to ship more milk to the Nescafe Chocolate Milk factory." He just got the news from his family. Because of my Pakistan days, I could relate to that since I saw with my own eyes how important a water buffalo cow was to a family's income. On another trip, the Punjabi driver was so impressed that I could talk some Hindi, he called his taxi driver friend in Vancouver and had me talk to the man.

In Adelaide, Australia we were on a taxi and I asked the Hindu driver if he knew how to get to heaven. “No, I don’t.” He was even unsure what heaven was all about. Perhaps he was thinking we'd ask him to take us there!! We were able to explain to him that you can’t use a GPS for that trip but because Jesus prepared the way we can join him in heaven simply by following him.

Our Muslim background believer friend, a taxi driver, picked up a newly arrived Uzbek couple at midnight and dropped them off at a hotel for free since they had no Canadian cash or credit card. Then he gave them our telephone number. So, they contacted us and we had many good opportunities to share Jesus.

One morning we took a taxi from our hotel to a church we were speaking at in Edmonton. The Somali taxi driver was quite distraught that there was another murder of a Somali young man over the week-end. Joy said, “I know someone who knows who killed the man.” “You do!?” asked the driver. Joy was able to share about Jesus who knows about all these things. He forgot where he was going and we had to redirect him to the right road! At the end of our trip, we gave him a ‘Jesus’ dvd. He thanked us profusely.

On another morning when I felt really lousy and quite discouraged, I took a taxi to see the doctor. All I could think of was “Jesus loves me, this I know…” so I started singing the chorus in the back seat. After about the 3rd time around, the taxi driver started singing along! I gave him a New Testament to find out more about Jesus.

And there have been many other incidents when we've been able to show our care for the taxi driver by enquiring about his family and well-being. Taxi drivers respond very well to a few words of greeting in their language. For a Muslim, “asalam a lekum' or for a Hindu “Namaste”. Sometimes the question will be “Are you a Muslim?” and that opens up an opportunity to explain who I am.

Dear heavenly Father. We know that you care for these taxi drivers. Help me to be alert and hear what you want me to say to each one. Amen