Be Careful, You May Run Over Yourself
When I was sixteen and learning to drive, I had a 1970 Ford van, Seafoam Green with a white stripe down the side. Dad had to go with me while I had the learner’s permit. I mowed 25 yards from April to September and kept quite busy.
After inspection, we realized the carter key that kept the rod in place that led down from the gear stick had come out. We were at a yard, which we mowed, and were getting ready to leave. I sat in the driver’s seat and shifted gears. Nothing happened. I knew the rod had come out of place. So, I crawled under the van to put it into place.
The rod would not reach the hole, so I pulled on it. When I did, I knocked the van into neutral and it started rolling. I was perpendicular to the front wheel, which was headed for my pelvic bone. I yelled to Dad as I scrambled out from under the van. He jumped across the engine shroud as he put on the brake and I ripped a hole in my jeans and made a gash in my knee, a scar I carry to this day. I almost ran over myself.
A similar thing happened in Florida recently. In Gainesville, a 48-year-old man (drinking according to police reports), angry at the woman behind him, got out of his truck and started banging on her car window at a red light. She drove away but nothing was holding his truck in place and it rolled into him. It fractured his hand and foot for which he was treated at a hospital. He was charged with a DUI and property damage.
Be sure your sins will find you out. That is a biblical principle we see playing out all around us. That’s what Moses told the tribes of Reuben, Gad, and Manasseh if they did not go fight with their fellow Israelite brothers: “Be sure your sin will find you out” (Numb. 32:23).
Solomon said, “The fool folds his hands and consumes his own flesh” (Ecc. 4:5). In Paul’s words, “For the one who sows to his own flesh will from the flesh reap corruption, but the one who sows to the Spirit will from the Spirit reap everlasting life” (Galatians 6:8).
Be careful. Think before you leap. Otherwise, you might run over yourself.
–Paul Holland