I am, I admit it, a satellite radio junkie. Despite the 150+ channels offered, it’s not the variety that attracts me – it’s the consistency. Since my job takes me in and around the geography of four states, I am delighted to be able to drive from Huntington to Roanoke without a single spec of effort being expended on seek, search or find tasks. The only knob twiddling necessary is an occasional adjustment to the volume. CD’s in the car aren’t my thing and keeping the iPod connected to the AUX port, well – ok, sometimes I do that, but I am a satellite radio kind of guy. My palette includes a wee bit of national news (too many commercials), a jazz channel called Watercolors and the channel that I am almost always, probably, certainly, maybe, for sure, usually tuned into, number 66, The Message. It is tagged with the genre Christian and given the description Christian Pop and Rock. They play songs by artists such as Mercy Me, Casting Crowns, Steven Curtis Chapman, and our own Michael W. Smith.
On a day in late August of this year, the station was ‘taken over’ by singer, song writer Natalie Grant. She was promoting the release of her new record (see, I’m old school) - her new album. She took on the role of DJ. (Do we still call them DJ’s? We have come full circle from record discs, to 8 tracks, to cassettes to compact discs and now to Digital – DJ’s). Natalie would tell about the making of the album, highlighting interesting factoids about an individual song as it would begin to play. She shared a particular story that reached into my mind as much as my heart. While traveling to the airport from her home in Nashville, she saw ahead a group of people working on the side of the road. They were all wearing orange vests. Her assumption was that they were simply a road crew, possibly picking up trash. As the car drew closer she said she noticed that the individuals seemed to be stooped over (almost as if weighted down or hiding) and were making a conscious effort NOT to make eye contact with the passersby. As the car was now even closer, she saw that on each vest were the words “I AM A DRUNK DRIVER”. Her point; what if we were all given a vest with our sins spelled out and forced to wear it in shame for all to see?
As I reflected on this story I wondered what the officials must have been thinking as they issued the vests. Did they lift up a silent prayer, “Thank you Lord that I’m not like THOSE people?” I, too often, am willing to play that role. ‘You don’t know what your sin is? Well, here friend, let me tell you.” I’ll even go the closet and find you the perfect vest with the sin written in the perfect font so that no one will have to squint. But wait, what’s this? Oh, it is my side of the closet; a hundred times wider, a hundred times higher and a million times deeper. My past, my present, my future – my sins. Vest after vest as far as the eye can see.
It is with a grateful heart I say “Come friend, let us go arm in arm, together, to get our new vests. They are here at the foot of the cross. They are one size fits all, and they bear only one word -- FORGIVEN.
Luke 6:39-41 41Why do you see the speck in your neighbor’s eye, but do not notice the log in your own eye? 42Or how can you say to your neighbor,* “Friend,* let me take out the speck in your eye”, when you yourself do not see the log in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your neighbor’s eye.
Steve Matthews
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