Plugged in and Charged Up
We arrived late at night after my husband’s shift ended at 10 p.m. Fresh sheets awaited us to crawl into for a good first night’s sleep in the RV for this season. As we approached, the inviting glow of the string of small blue awning lights, and the dining table lamp which boasted, “Home Sweet Home” on its stem welcomed us inside. Despite a full day of physically hard work which my 67-year-old body painfully resisted, I felt content and happy that we were now on the upswing of our two year wait to begin our full-time RV experience.
I smiled to myself in anticipation of Hubby’s surprise at all the hard work I had put in preparing the camper for our first overnight stay. I unlocked the door, smiled again, and headed for the master light panel which would allow me to turn on all the lights or just a few. I decided to turn them all on for dramatic affect. As I tapped the panel’s “ON” button, there came a shaded glow of romantically dimmed lights such as you would find in the far corner of a fine restaurant. While we do have our romantic moments, I had planned for a Genesis type of “let there be light” when I tapped the panel’s “ON” switch.
“Why are the lights so dim?” I exclaimed. Hubby looked ceilingward. “We’re plugged in, right? I had all the lights on this afternoon. They were fine!”
Hubby came to the panel and checked the battery condition. It had very little charge.
“Why are we using battery” I asked, “when we’re plugged into city power?” Just as I asked that, we heard a beeping sound - the carbon monoxide detector was beeping! I flashed back to a previous experience I had with a carbon monoxide detector sounding its alarm. I turned toward the door. I said, “I’m going back to the apartment and sleep on the floor. With that thing going off, I’m not staying here.”
Hubby tried to assure me it was likely just a glitch but it landed on deaf ears.
“Just wait then. I’ll go with you.”
What a night it was! We had sold all of our furniture except for a double recliner. I couldn’t get to sleep in the recliner, so I headed to the floor in the bedroom. I found a pillow but the hard floor was too much for my aching hip so I decided to put hubby’s coat under me. I folded it over, laid it under my left side and gently eased back onto a pocket full of keys. I whipped out the keys and chucked them a little distance away to try again. Yes, that felt better. For about five minutes. I got up, grabbed the pillow, and went to the recliner. It felt quite comfortable after the hard floor, and I was thankful it was still in the apartment!
The next sound I heard was hubby coming into the apartment! He had been up early, went to the RV, discovered the issue, and had it all fixed. We could now return home. Hubby explained that the detectors and the lights all have to operate on 12v so the camper’s converter uses the battery to do the conversion for those 12v needs when we are plugged into a power source. He had already been to the store, purchased a charger for the battery which would boost it when it got low and when it was at full charge, it would automatically revert to a trickle charge to maintain the battery power. The lights will only operate if the battery is charged, regardless of our connection to the main power source.
What charges your battery? Oh, I know you’re plugged into the Main Power Source, Jesus, but what do you do to keep your battery charged so that the light of His love is not dimmed but converted to useful energy which allows your light to shine out to a strained and hurting world? You might think being plugged into the Power Source is enough, but to be useful in God’s kingdom, you need to keep your battery charged!
How do you charge your spiritual battery? Use the comment section below to share ways you have found to not just stay plugged in, but to maintain your charge!