Ch 3: Learning to Trust God
My parents taught me to give God the credit...and the message stuck.
A Surprising Discovery
The year was 1982. Husband and I had only been dating for a few months. We were both several years into our careers at Westinghouse Electric Corporation’s Research and Development (R&D) Center in Churchill, an eastern suburb of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
Things had been pretty stable over that time in terms of the workforce. Some new people came in. Other people went elsewhere or retired. To my young, inexperienced mind, it felt like things would always be this way. If only because, in my limited time frame, they had always been this way.
[Editor's Note: This article is Chapter 3 in my serialized memoir “Well Guided: My Life as a Student at the International Academy of God,” in which I share some of the many ways God has had a hand in my life. Access previous chapters via the Table of Contents.]
And then, the bottom dropped out. A young woman, only recently hired after a successful internship, had been laid off in our department. Others took early retirement. Other departments had cut backs as well. This turn of events shook Husband’s confidence to the core.
“Oh, no! She was last in, and she got laid off. Before her, I was the last hired. What will I do if I get laid off? What if we BOTH get laid off? What will we do?” He was beside himself with concern over the situation.
I sat there completely nonplussed.
“Aren’t you worried? How can you be so calm?” he badgered.
I replied, matter-of-factly, “I’m not worried. God will take care of us. We’ll figure something out.”
Husband leaned back in his chair, astonished. Here was an attitude he’d never seen before.
For my part, I was surprised by his surprise. I suddenly discovered I had something he didn’t: a rock-solid faith.
I remember that day clearly, the two of us sitting across from one another, in one of our side-by-side, his-and-hers offices in the 801 building. It’s a story I’ve repeated over and over.
But until I sat down to write about it, I couldn’t really say how I’d come to that attitude of complete trust in God. Where, I wondered, had that come from?
The Foundations of Trust
After sleeping on that question for a week or so, the answer became clear. That trust started with my upbringing.
My parents taught me to see God, rather than luck, as responsible for good things, good outcomes in life.
My mom, Zoanne, a sixth-generation member of our faith tradition, lived her faith to the core. That included regular attendance at Wednesday evening prayer and testimony services. To which I was compelled to tag along.
As a grade school student, most of those services really dragged for me. At first, Mom would let me lie on the hard wooden pew when I grew drowsy. As I got older, that option was out. The prayer time was the worst. How could someone pray for so long? I wondered.
But the testimony time caught my interest. I enjoyed listening to the stories of God working in someone’s life. Especially the stories about God’s working in my own mother’s life. As a young girl, I just took in those stories at face value, without question.
Then, between 7th and 10th grade, I had the opportunity to spend a lot of time with my dad, Ron, in the car. My frequent chauffeur, he would drive me to various activities, such as All-City Orchestra, where I played flute and piccolo.
Stories from My Father
As a tween, I wasn’t much of a conversationalist. But Dad loved to tell me about his work and his life. Sometimes he’d talk about things that were beyond my technical skills, like some problem he had solved in measuring for the metal staircases and handrails he built as part of his job. Like I did with prayer time in those services, I usually zoned out when Dad was talking about work.
But he also talked about being in World War II. For some reason, I remember him mentioning B-52 bombers. A lot. He talked about them so much, I grew up with the impression he had flown in them. It wasn’t until later that I discovered B-52’s hadn’t even been made until after WWII. Dad had to have flown in B-17 bombers. Either way, he was fascinated with aircraft and had almost become a pilot.
He could have been killed, I learned, while training to be a gunner. Something had gone wrong with the bomber’s landing gear. The pilot had to land in the desert on the belly. Somehow the entire crew survived without a scratch. Dad attributed his survival, in retrospect, to God.
He also liked to say that God had a hand in his assignment to a reconnaissance unit. Dad came out of the war with a clear conscience, never having been involved in a bombing.
Of course, he credited God for meeting Zoanne during the one semester he attended the University of Pittsburgh. He was studying Spanish in the Nationality Room next door to Zoanne’s German class. They hung out with friends in the same alcove of the huge gothic Commons Room on the main floor of the Cathedral of Learning.
Apparently, if it weren’t for marrying my mother, he would say, he would still be puffing cigarettes, guzzling beer, and skipping church instead of being a clean-living, ordained minister who fully appreciated his close relationship with God.
If my parents taught me to see God as the driver of good outcomes, it was God who gave me those good outcomes. Let me give you an example.
The Case of the Quick-Release Rear Axle
Over the years, I have had a lot of odd breakdowns and issues with my vehicles while out on the road. I have always sensed God has been looking out for me at these times, because of what didn’t happen.
Perhaps the freakiest (and funniest) incident involved what my co-worker RRM teasingly dubbed the "Quick-Release Rear Axle."
Back in my earliest days at the R&D Center, I would drive 14 miles from my home in Mt. Lebanon to work in Churchill. Of course, in Pittsburgh, that meant going uphill and down, through two tunnels, across one river, and over multiple streams and gullies... in rush hour traffic.
Right out of college, and for the first couple years of my first marriage, Dad continued to take care of my car for me. Ron had an amazing natural ability to take on any sort of mechanical project. Cars were his forte. He'd never consider paying someone for auto repairs he could easily do himself.
The first full winter I worked at R&D (1977) was a brutal one. The snowstorms and icy road conditions were the worst we'd seen in years. Even with studded snow tires, my old rear-wheel-drive Nova was struggling to make it up the steeper hills.
Come Spring, Dad decided to take action. He didn't want me to face those on-the-road risks again the following winter. He had what he thought was a brilliant idea. He went to the junkyard in search of the perfect solution: Positraction.
He found exactly what he needed—the limited-slip differential and rear axle from a wrecked 1970 Nova. He brought home his prize and worked all weekend to retrofit it to my car.
That Monday, I drove 14 miles across town, as usual. Coming home, I took a left off low-lying Banksville Road and began the steep climb up Wenzell Avenue.
Just past the building on the left-hand corner, I noticed a police car in the building's tiny parking lot. The road began a slight curve to the right. Suddenly, I heard a loud, scary CLUNK. The car stopped moving. I quickly put my foot on the brake to be sure the Nova wouldn't drift backwards.
I looked in my side mirror and realized I could still see the police car. I cranked down the window. Leaning out, I waved and yelled "Hey, Mr. Policeman!" Sounds kind of silly to me now, but it got his attention.
He walked over, waving other cars around me. I told him about the clunk. He leaned over to peek under the rear bumper. "Looks like you dropped your axle, miss.”
"Oh, no! My dad just installed Positraction over the weekend."
"Well, you're not going anywhere. I'll have to call you a tow truck."
Back at his house, Dad knew right away what had happened. He had thought the bolts that came with the new axle were long enough...if just barely. But, clearly, he needed longer ones. An easy fix.
So what were the results?
I was late getting dinner on the table that night.
I had to pay a towing charge (or Dad did) for a distance of about 3 miles.
Dad had some unexpected auto repair work that week.
I had to listen to ribbing from RRM for years.
All of that was less inconvenient (for me) than running out of gas. And all because the bolts came loose at the precise moment in a 28-mile round trip when the help I would need was within shouting distance. Literally.
I don't know what I would have done otherwise. At the moment of that quick release, I didn't know what was wrong, from my position in the driver's seat. I was afraid to take my foot off the brake because I was on a hill. And I was about 25 years away from owning a cell phone.
You can say it was a lucky coincidence. You can say I have the luck of the Irish. I say it was just another example of how God always has my back. Thank you, Lord!
I can count a dozen other times when travel was interrupted by an event that could have resulted in injury, fatality, or at the very least extreme inconvenience. But none of that happened. Ever.
Help was always near, and injury averted.
Finding Gainful Employment
Another big area where I have always been able to count on God is in finding gainful employment. Take, for example, the story of how I got my first professional job after college.
At the end of high school, my then-boyfriend’s (now-ex-husband’s) father, Lou, one day appeared on my doorstep. He had recommended me for a summer job where he worked, at Westinghouse’s Advanced Systems Technology Division. I don’t remember asking him to do this for me. It was like manna from heaven.
There was a minor downside to what became three summers-worth of employment. The AST Division was located in a 50-plus-year-old building. If you were lucky enough to get a cubicle along the outside wall, that meant you had a not-so-lovely view of sooty old concrete and asphalt and railroad tracks. The neighborhood was depressing and the commute was long, but I was happy to have the work.
Fast forward to the end of the coursework for my Bachelor’s degree at Carnegie Mellon University, in December 1975. I hadn’t yet gotten a job offer. Since I had already worked for Westinghouse, I was aware of a special “graduate” hiring program. I applied and was accepted.
The graduate program was administered by Westinghouse’s Education Department. Under this program, I could be sent to up to six different locations within Westinghouse. I would spend a month at each location. Hopefully, one of those locations would make an offer of permanent employment.
When I interviewed at the Education Department, I told them I really wanted to try working at the R&D Center. After working at a grim, dirty, concrete and steel factory for three summers, I was looking for a workplace with a more uplifting vibe.
I had seen the R&D Center grounds once when giving someone a ride home. It was like working in the middle of a park. There were vast stretches of green grass, woods on three sides of the property, a duck pond, a plaza with shooting fountains, a serene raked-pebble Japanese garden, and walking trails through it all. Perfect.
But when I mentioned my interest in working at R&D, the curt reply was, “You can just forget about working there. They aren’t hiring.” In fact, they couldn’t tell me how long it might be until any location gave me a shot. Economically, 1975 had been a tough year.
I left the interview disappointed and discouraged. Since it was right before Christmas, I decided to just enjoy my holidays before going back to job hunting in earnest.
The first week in January, I got a call from Carl. Carl needed to hire someone with my background. He had gotten my name from a friend of his who was the Chairman of the Statistics Department at Carnegie Mellon. This professor had told Carl I was looking for a job.
So Carl was calling to see if I’d be interested in coming in for an interview. You can guess where Carl worked… Westinghouse R&D Center. Exactly where I wanted to be. The job fit me like a glove. Carl was one of the best bosses I have ever worked for.
This unexpected turn was another indication that God could be trusted to look out for my best interests. And what a contrast with human institutions—a couple weeks after I started that job, the Education Center sent me a letter. They had found me a one-month look-see job at another Westinghouse location. I was astounded. They had no idea I had already been at my desk for two weeks, at the very place they told me to forget about.
Why I Trust God
So, there are the reasons for my unswerving trust in God. Well, maybe not the only reasons. There are yet more stories for another time. My parents taught me to give God the credit when things went unexpectedly, abnormally, supernaturally right, and the message stuck.
Driving my faith journey is the fact that from the time I was a child, I learned to give God the credit. Not luck. Not fate or destiny. Never have I said or even thought, I was lucky, although I’m sure that to others, it looks that way.
And right along with trust, my courage has grown, too.
So, when faced with a threat of layoff, or an actual layoff, or an economy about to tank, or any number of other potentially worrisome events, or even a promise of a baby girl who did not appear as I thought sure she would, I draw on my deeply dug well of trust, look straight ahead, and foot to the floor, I just keep going.
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