Blogging yesterday about Nate’s photo album full of car pictures got me thinking. In every family a car purchase is a big deal. Sometimes the biggest deal isn’t a fancy new car but a “junker,” significant because it’s someone’s first car, bought with their own money as a teenager. Other times the big deal is a first new-not-used car, or someone’s first sports car.

As I thumbed through the album pages yesterday, my vote for biggest-deal cars went to the ones that had been in accidents. Though cars were damaged, drivers and passengers weren’t.

Like the time Nelson was driving on a country road as a college senior, studying a map. When he looked up, it was too late to avoid hitting a phone truck parked half-on and half-off the road. The car was totaled, but the driver’s seat and driver were intact.

Or the time Hans fell asleep behind the wheel driving home for a family reunion, rolling his car 3 times before landing upsidedown. A totaled car but not a scratch on Hans.

Or a potentially fatal accident when a car turned in front of Linnea, causing her to crash head-on into a concrete bridge support.

Or the time Birgitta’s hood flew up against her windshield, blinding her view at 70 mph. It could have been fatal, but she was unharmed.

Or Klaus, unable to stop when a lady turned in front of him, crashing into her. Another totaled vehicle.

Or the time Lars was driving and his wheel dipped into a ditch, coming to an abrupt stop on a concrete pipe in the ground. The rounded imprint of his head and his passenger’s (Nelson) remained in the shattered windshield.

It’s those pictures that mean the most, difficult as it is to look at them. None of us can prepare for accidents which are, by definition, unexpected. But can we be ready in the sense of knowing what we’ll do in the aftermath?

Any one of our family accidents could have turned out differently, and there’s no guarantee they won’t in the future. I lost a close cousin to a car crash when she was 17 and a precious niece at 23. The question is, how do we cope with such seemingly random, unfair tragedies?

News reports are full of them every day, and none of us are exempt from accidents and the damage and loss they cause. (Ecclesiastes 9:12) When they happen, the first thing we want to do is make sense of the circumstances, and  that’s often impossible. But there is one rational thing we can do, and that’s run to God. He calms and comforts whether things make sense or not. Maybe especially when they don’t.

So as I closed the album, hoping no further accidents will ever occur, if they do, I know exactly what to do.

“I take limitations in stride, and with good cheer, these limitations that cut me down to size—abuse, accidents, opposition, bad breaks. I just let Christ take over! And so the weaker I get, the stronger I become.” (2 Corinthians 12:10, The Message)