The Day I Gave My Heart to Jesus ~Moving Music Monday: “Windows Down” by Cain
It was a warm summer day in Eastern Oregon, and I was barely 17. It was perfect weather for a drive with the windows down on my 30-minute lunch break. I got in my White 1987 Hatchback Honda Accord with home-done tinted windows. The interior was a faded blue, and the music was loud.
I headed West from my Uncle’s Auto Part store where I worked. I wore my long-jean Abercrombie and Fitch skirt, and blue Napa Auto Parts shirt. I planned to smoke 1 of the 2 or 3 cigarettes I allowed myself a day. I think I was addicted to the ritual more than the tobacco. I’d be careful to hide my smoking from any car that drove by and equally careful not to get any ashes inside. Then there was the gum immediately after the cigarette because the cigarettes tasted so gross. The lotion was then applied to cover the smell on my hands until I could use the bathroom and wash them. Body mist was next to cover my clothes and the blue interior.
I Inhaled and exhaled as I drove the country roads. Time goes by quickly when driving with windows down and the music loud.
By seventeen, I had experienced many hard life lessons and losses that many of my peers hadn’t experienced. These hard life lessons left me with haunting questions like:
What happens after we die?
Is there more to life than working hard and making a lot of money, as was modeled in my life?
Sex, drugs, and alcohol don’t seem to bring my loved ones true or lasting happiness. It certainly wasn’t working for me. There’s got to be more than partying on the weekends. Is there a deeper meaning to this life?
These questions were so prevalent in my mind that I started asking them out loud to anyone who would listen. That summer, I started doing (essentially) impromptu Bible studies with my Aunt and my Aunt’s parents. They’d encourage me to watch different preachers who honestly seemed a little slimey, but what they had to say was fascinating to me.
The studies and preachers were the beginning of my search for answers to my haunting questions. My newfound answers made sense, felt right, and provided more hope than anything I had previously been surrounded by.
My cigarette was done, and I had just driven out of the last s curve. I was driving around 55 MPH, headed East back to the Auto Parts Store. Buzzed, not thinking about anything but maybe my detailed ritual of hiding the cigarettes and which door I would go to to head to the bathroom to wash my hands.
An older red Ford pick-up was going West at about 55 miles, and the moment we passed each other going opposite directions down the highway, I saw an older man with tanned, leathered skin with gray hair. He had some cow dog on the bed of his pickup, hanging over the edge, watching what was coming next. The man, pickup, and dog all looked like they had worked hard all their lives. The man looked like his life’s hourglass had more sand at the bottom than at the top.
With the red pickup in my rearview mirror, a sudden peace came over me as I thought, “I know what happens after death! There is more to this life than working hard and money!” And then I said aloud something like, “Yes, Jesus! I believe!” And right there on a country highway in Eastern Oregon, going 55 MPH, I accepted Jesus in my heart. I fought back tears as I drove the last few miles back to work. Jesus has been in my heart ever since.
I wish I could say life has been happily ever after, but that’s not the reality in this world. For example, there are still days when an American Spirit and the ritual I detailed above seems like a good idea. By the grace of God, I have broken generational habits such as smoking. Thank God, vaping wasn’t a thing when I was a teenager.
Do you ever hear a song that is so relatable that it seems as though it’s from a page of your own life’s story? The song “Windows Down” by Cain eloquently parallels my own conversion experience. I’ve included the lyric video here for your listening pleasure:
Jesus will meet you where you are, even if that’s in a beat-up car smoking a cigarette going down a country road. He does the transforming. You do the believing/trusting. I’m praying and rooting for you.
God is love,
Vanessa
PS. Kids, don’t smoke. It’s dumb and not cool.