By Dean LuskA while back I was driving toward an odd five-way intersection and was about to make a left turn. I put my blinker on and waited for the police car coming toward me in the other lane to pass by. To my surprise,
without using his blinker, the policeman slowed for what seemed like an eternity and made a right turn onto the road I was waiting to turn onto. Without sarcasm (to my wife's surprise and to my own), I said to my wife, "Hey, he didn't use a blinker. And look! He's talking on the phone!"
Very uncool.
As I was on my way to a church meeting one Sunday morning (also a while back), chugging along at the speed limit, a car zoomed past me, shattering the speed limit. The driver was dressed well, and given the time of day and the fact that we live in the Bible Belt,
it's a moderately safe assumption that he was on his way to church services somewhere. I'm not stating that he
was; just saying that it's probable.
I'm too critical -- this I know. However, in both cases above, I'm likely not the only person who'd notice that something was at least slightly awry.
All those reading are probably familiar with Jesus' parable of the talents in
Matthew 25. There are a couple of points that are super-important. First,
we're expected by God to be good stewards of the title "Christ-follower" and all that it includes. Second (not mentioned in the parable, so thereby not to be taken as the words of Jesus, but as my own)
people are watching to see what we do. I should interject that I really need to give my two example people the benefit of the doubt, and I do, but they were perfect examples for this post. The cop may have been dealing with a personally stressful situation on the phone, and the speeding car could have been driven by a guy on his way to see his lady friend or something.
Following is a very short list of the kinds of things that the Christ-follower should never say. Legalist thinking? Not in my opinion.
- "I know I have 37 items in my basket, but this 'express' line at Chaos-Mart is shorter than the only other one that's open, so I'll use it anyway."
- "He won't ever know the difference."
- "I just don't feel convicted to obey the speed limit."
- "He needs to be taught a lesson." (...when uttered with a malicious heart. Otherwise, this one's permissible and can possibly be adviseable sometimes.)
These thoughts and others like them lead to wrong behavior -- behavior that people will observe. Even if we somehow don't consider the resulting actions to be destructive to our walk with Christ, that they can, and very likely will, wind up being destructive to our witness.
"
Be careful to live properly among your unbelieving neighbors. Then even if they accuse you of doing wrong, they will see your honorable behavior, and they will give honor to God when he judges the world." (
1 Peter 2:12, NLT)
Ripping off my own writing, this is a repost of "Obeying '20 Items or Less'" from EGBDF in 2008.
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Comments (16)
Small breaking of those rules meant to ease life for people lead to a generally anti-social attitude fermenting below the surface, often unrealized.
On the Christian level, the worse thing most people can do is to decorate their person or their cars etc with Christian symbols and quotes. Everyone is prone to be an arsehole every now and again and to be seen to do a selfish thing by a neutral observor is to solidify him in his wariness of the message. It is to spread the Bad News (of Christian behaviour). It certainly helped push me away from the Church and those outspoken in it's defence, while putting themselves before others.
Rany over. Back to my breakfast cup(s) of coffee.
All we can be expected to do is the best we can do in any given point in time. I'm constantly working on speeding, but not because I'll get caught, because I seem to have what it takes to talk my way out of that situation, but because I can see horrible damage done, with innocent victims involved. And my language, which I was practically bred on, I now see in my children, and the guilt is horrendous, so that's a work in progress. Christians don't have anything over on anybody else. We're just as fraught with sin as the guy down the street. The difference is we should know better, and by using ourselves as an example for Christ, we can be a better teacher than someone going door to door with a message of Christ.
I am a Christian. I am a law abiding citizen. Mostly.
Last year my grandchild was critically ill and air lifted to a hospital 2 hours away. I got in my car (it was midnight) and sped to where he was. I was driving upwards of 90 mph. I blew by a state policeman who immediately pulled me and my daughter over. Once I briefly explained the situation, he waved me on with his blessing. Did I feel guilt or conviction for my"sin". Nope. My point? There are times when life calls for such drastic circumventions of made made rules. Remember even Christ picked wheat on the Sabbath. I do believe we are required to be a good example of holy living. But, if we are not cautious we can get so caught up in following the rules, we forget about the heart. And really god does teach us that it is the heart that HE desires above all things.
Matthew 7:3 Read it. Live it.
20 items or fewer. Christians should abide by grammar rules.
Could the cop possibly have been dealing with a job-related phone call? Could the speeder have been rushing to the home of an ill friend, or to the hospital? If you're going to take the time to observe things like that (and make character judgments), at least acknowledge that there could be extraneous circumstances that you, A STRANGER, don't know about. Don't worry so much about what your neighbor is doing. It will stress you less.
As for putting too many items in the express check-out, that's just wrong.@NightCometh@xanga -
@WaitingToShrug@xanga - Agreed.
Perhaps consider this. I heard it onetime and please correct me if I'm saying it wrong. Some people have good and they are rich in life and junk and God says with a serious and stern voice, they have been given their reward. Whereas those who are faithful and humble to Him, God says with a smile, their reward awaits them in heaven.
And yes, @WaitingToShrug is completely right, like ALL things in life, you never know the circumstances on stuff.
I work that express lane at Chaos-Mart. 37 items as opposed to 20 items is a big difference and has the ability to slow down a line substantially due to the fact that express lane registers are typically not built or equipped to deal with much over 15. Just sayin'.
I'm not a Christian, but I think it's important to observe certain rules that when broken can affect others in detrimental ways.
As the checker at that express lane, however, I don't get exasperated with those 37 items. I'm usually good all the way up til around 60 (which is the average-sized transaction at my store). I understand that people may be in a rush for all sorts of reasons, or could have a disability that isn't immediately evident that keeps them from using the more narrow and crowded lanes of the bigger checkout stands for small, quick orders. For me, it is personally important for me to understand that the person I see in front of me is only one millionth of the person they actually are, and that there are plenty of things I am not aware of that may be affecting their day. If I have the capability to help them, I will.
I'll be honest. It really ticks me off to be stuck behind very slow drivers. If a person likes waiting at red lights it's their business, but I don't like it when they make it mine. The ultimate purpose behind driving is to get someplace safely, and to that end streets are just a network to accomplish that purpose. I'm not saying it's ok to ignore the speed limit, weave in and out of traffic, or take other dangerous risks like not slowing enough for a turn because the light's changing. But.. taking the entire length to the next light to get up to speed so that everyone behind gets stuck with every red light, being the guy with 20 cars packed behind them because it's a single lane and no one can pass- or not getting over so others can pass, and then showing a complete lack of aggression when a slight increase in speed would mean the difference between making a light.. because the driver can see the crosswalk numbers ticking down.. are all things that really tick me off. And if one of them had a Christian bumper sticker it would not make me very happy about their witness either - I'd much rather be behind someone who is driving reasonably and with the flow of traffic even if it is a bit over. I do admit I am very un-Christian in my thoughts at those times. I'm not proud of that and try to keep from sinning but wow is it easy to not guard my thoughts. It's particularly frustrating because I already work long night hours and prefer not to waste any more of it on my way home with completely avoidable delays. If that makes sense.
(To clarify-- the key points are to get where you are going safely. There's never an excuse to drive unsafely and I wasn't trying to imply otherwise. So not really disagreeing just maybe offering another perspective when it comes to a person's witness driving. You will upset people if you push the speed limit and you will upset people if you don't. I wish getting upset wasn't the easy part!)
The reason people should use their turn signals and avoid things like following too closely or going a different speed from traffic* is not because of how it reflects upon Christians, but because of roadway safety. It's easy to forget that your piloting several hundred pounds of steel, and that such an object can easily kill a human being, but it's the unavoidable truth and no amount of jesus or prayer is going to make it untrue. You may receive forgiveness or grace or whatever you people call it, but the person you ran over is still dead.
*notice I did not say speed limit; if you are going slower than
everybody else on the road, you are a road hazard even if your actions
are legal in the very strictest sense. The fact that you can hurt somebody is always morally relevant.
The Bible says that we should obey the laws of man so long as they don't go against God's laws.
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@NeverSubmit@xanga - The people speeding to go with the flow are the road hazards, not the ones obeying the speed limit. Remember, driving is not a "right". All Christians are to have self control and integrity to do the safe and correct action no matter what.
@Jar - Did I say driving was a right? And stop expecting me to care what religion you are. It doesn't matter. Traffic safety is not like keeping kosher. Everyone has to do it, and you have to go with the flow. The reason it has to be relatively uniform is because other drivers have to know what to expect from you in order to react safely. The only time it is safe to drive as if you are the only person on the road is when you really are the only person on the road. It's dangerous to refuse to take other drivers' responses into account, and to fail to communicate adequately.