Surry County has several beautiful, seemingly endless, winding roads with stunning scenery that are a pleasure to see and drive along — in the daylight.

At night, those same attractive roads can become ceaseless death traps if you don’t know where you are going.

What, in daylight, was a scenic sight of gorgeous nature can become a frightening dark silhouette of lanky trees and black sky at night.

I recently discovered this on my way back to the office from a late-night meeting out in the middle of nowhere.

I visited a location just on the outskirts of the county that had inadequate streetlighting, which really means no lights at all, and very narrow roads.

After pulling out from a gravel road, I entered the main road and drove for a few miles before I realized I was headed in the wrong direction.

I quickly became frustrated, coupled with anger and fear.

Here, I was along some dark road in the middle of nowhere with no sense of direction and images of various horror movies about people getting lost and terrible things happening to them running through my mind. And I had no cell phone signal. Nada. Zap. Nothing.

As I frantically tried to maneuver my way along the winding roads in increasing panic, I looked to the sky and suddenly gained a sense of peace.

I needed to trust God. It’s so easy to find our way through situations when we can see clearly, when we have the daylight to shine on all the street signs and make people look less suspicious.

That night was a real-life metaphor, not something repeated from a book or sent in an e-mail — it really happened to me.

On that dark night, I learned what it means to trust God. I took a deep breath, asked him to lead me and I found my way to my destination, safe and sound.

I drove aimlessly for about 10 minutes before I found a familiar road and was able to make my way back.

Sometimes getting lost doesn’t just occur on a dark road in the middle of nowhere, which is really scary, but it can be losing sense of your purpose or motivation. It can be forgoing your morals and values for a period of time or just needing to rejuvenate a struggling relationship.

Whatever reason we become lost, God is always there.

So turn to him, and trust that he has a road map better than any human could design.

Erin C. Perkins is a staff reporter for the Mount Airy News. She can be reached at eperkins@mtairynews.com or 719-1952.