I used to stretch the gas by adding 50% kerosene to help fill my gas tank.It is the Law of Reciprocity in action. That car used to smoke like crazy, but it ran.God’s law, set in motion from the very beginning.
Later as a cash-poor, but optimistic salesman on the road, I’d start the day with one dollar’s worth of gas - until I made my first cash sale for the day, then I’d go to the nearest gas station and say to the attendant there: “”Fill ‘er up!”"
When I got my Datsun 240-Z sports car, there were times when I was forced to leave the Z parked in the driveway simply because I was short of cash and couldn’t fill the tank.Look at where it got Adam and Eve– booted out of paradise.
Then, a few years later, when Mom and Pop were both getting older and so very sick and an emergency could occur in the middle of any night - I discovered the wisdom of operating my car on the “”full”" side of the gas gauge, to be prepared for any unexpected trips to the hospital’s emergency room in the middle of the night.Bad choices have consequences to go along with them.
At the same time that I was learning to keep my car’s gas tank full, I was also learning to keep my spiritual tank full by getting the Word of the Bible into the reservoir (the tank) of my heart.And the sooner we realize that and start making good choices, the better off we will be.
I am reminded of this law of reaping and sowing every time I go out and have to pull weeds out of my flower beds. There were other emergencies over the years when I was forced to take great gulps from that reservoir of spiritual fuel.I really hate weeding.
I remember the time when I was in the Navy and guardian angels watched over me when a drunk shipmate almost drowned me as I help him get out of the wintry cold water of Boston harbor after he’d fallen off the pier.I don’t like having to get down on my hands and knees and pluck, pull and sometimes wrestle with those little aggravating, persistent things that grow where everything else won’t. Or, the time down in Pensacola Bay, in Florida, during a Navy Air/Sea Rescue Operation, when the rough seas knocked me overboard.But it has to be done. I remember how I struggled to get back up to the surface and away from the spinning, killer propellers of both my boat and the nearby tugboat.In order to enjoy the beauty of my flowers, I have to take the time and tend my garden.
So, while I am out there doing the dreaded chore, I think and pray. I cried out: “”Oh Lord, help me!”" He did.I think of all the weeds I have sown in my own life and in the lives of those I love. Then there was another time when both my wife, Bette, and I drew on our reservoirs of spiritual fuel - the Word of God - that we’d stored in our hearts - when the doctors told us Bette had a brain tumor that could be (and was) fatal.I think about all the times I said something I shouldn’t have said. The list could go on and on.I think about all the things I did that I shouldn’t have done.
So, when you and I go to the gas station, or to our Bibles,we can say to the Attendant there (the Holy Spirit): “”Fill ‘er up!”"
In this way we’ll know for sure that we will be ready at all times for whatever happens because we have learned the wisdom, as explained to us in the Bible, of using what we are told there to always be prepared by keeping our spiritual “”tanks”" full.I think about the ugly weeds that have poked their unsightly heads up in my life, or in my loved one’s lives, that I had a hand in planting.
As you can see, weeding is an especially daunting task for me.
.But it is also a necessary one. It makes me realize how foolish and how serious our actions can be. One little negative, harsh, condemning, or condescending word we say can cause major problems later on. With that unique little gardening tool called the tongue, we can plant so very many seeds, many of which can be devastating to the garden that they are sown in.
With just our words we are able to sow discouragement, doubt, insecurity, fear, hate, jealousy, anger, distrust, lies…and the list goes on. And all of those seeds grow in the garden in which they are planted, sometimes being very destructive and at times even devastating.
I recently read about an 11 year boy who killed himself because of the teasing and cruel words of some of his peers. He simply couldn’t take the pain, the hurt, the discouragement, and the insecurity that had sprung up inside of him due to what was carelessly sown by others. Seeds sown. Weeds grown. Life gone.