Here’s Rich Dixon:

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Gren-vul was a great place for a rest day.

Old churches and jazz clubs, imagining civil rights struggles and music legends on those same streets. An interview for the evening news.

We returned to The Shotgun House, books in hand. The place was busy this evening. The local news appeared on the television above the bar.

As the newscaster introduced Rich’s Ride, Monte’s floppy-eared face filled the screen. Folks pointed and whispered as they recognized him. When the feature ended, a man approached our table. Monte greeted him, and after a thorough ear-scratching he took out his wallet and handed Becky several bills. “Please take this in honor of my niece. She’d be amazed and pleased by what you’re doing.”

His niece was paralyzed in a car wreck as a high school senior. She recovered and received a bachelor’s degree as a rehabilitation counselor.

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So many people face and overcome illness, injury, financial hardship, and relational pain…mostly it happens away from public view as people find ways to survive and flourish in apparently insurmountable situations.

God’s at work.

In ordinary, everyday lives and events, He’s present, doing a new thing in powerful ways that so frequently go unnoticed. We were blessed to hear and experience so many of these stories.

This was the vision. It was never about the bike ride. It was about sharing hope, offering one tangible bit of assurance that hope really does change what’s possible. It was about opening doors, providing opportunities for others to convey stories of courage and resilience.

Hope doesn’t guarantee happy endings. We didn’t hear “happily ever after” at the Shotgun House. We imagine a world in which children aren’t paralyzed by random bullets while they sleep, where vibrant teens don’t leave home in a car and return in a wheelchair. But in a broken and unjust world, pain and suffering are realities that don’t disappear at the end of a magic rainbow.

I don’t know why God permits such tragedy.

He promises the pain is never pointless, and He promises to redeem and bring good from our struggles. That’s the basis of hope that transforms the impossible into everyday one-degree miracles that change the world.