Close calls

I drive the same route to work pretty much every morning, and I did exactly that yesterday. There's are sections along the two major east-west roads that get blocked up really easily because two stoplights are so close together... on both roads. Many commuters, who start on the further south east-west road but need to sneak up to more northern one, have found a legal "cheat" along this route, whereby we cut up a side street into the back lot of a WalMart. We go through the lot and can make a right turn onto the further north major east-west road, and you bypass most of the congestion around those stoplights.

It's not a bad tactic, it has saved me time each morning, and it's pretty safe. Yesterday, there was a slight mist in the air and on the ground, and I was cutting through the lot, about to make a right turn onto the road. After the last car in a glut of fast commuters, I had a window of several seconds to make my turn before another glut came. Just as I turned, I got rear-ended by the car behind me, and I ended up in the middle of the two eastbound lanes. I was able to gather myself and drive up to the next parking lot and drive in before the next cars came, and the lady that struck me followed me into the lot. I was able to punch the bumper back into place, and rub most of the paint from her car off of mine. Not much more damage than that, fortunately. I just told her to forget it and go on with our day.

As I drove to work, I realized that the lady didn't hit me because of the opening in traffic. She wasn't paying attention, probably due to a cellphone. And it could have happened at any point, even while fast cars were flying in the lane I was about to turn into. I'm not exaggerating when I say that if I had gotten hit three seconds earlier or five seconds later, I'm in a big pile-up. And the lady is still in the parking lot, safe.

Back in college, I had an intro to religion class, and I remember a discussion about bad things happening to us. A girl in front of me was telling the class about a religious friend of hers that had gotten into an accident, and thanked God that the accident was not worse. She bluntly asked that if God were so good, then why didn't He prevent the whole accident in the first place?

I had a similar situation over three years ago when I was hit by a car on my bike, and I was knocked into a busy Chicago thoroughfare. A few seconds earlier or later, and I'm run over by oncoming traffic. I had some scratches on my leg, and my bike was busted pretty good. But I was fine and I just shook it off. Yesterday, I had a more spiritual approach to the accident.

Back then, I missed the message. The girl in my religion class missed the message.

"Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes." James 4:14

We all need a reminder of our mortality. It's so easy to assume you have days, weeks, months, years ahead of you. And then I miss the urgency of now. And I may put off an assignment from God another day. Or fail to deliver some time-sensitive blessing to someone else. Or miss a miracle that God has for me.

If you think about the circumstances, I really could have been killed yesterday, or a few years ago. And walking away with a new appreciation for today is a beautiful blessing. In this selfish society, we seek comfort... trouble-free, fear-free, luxury, glamour, pleasure, etc. And any time something bad happens, we fail to see the point. The girl in my religion class thinks that life is about her trying to find residence on Easy Street. But life can be taken away before you find Easy Street on Google Earth.

Yesterday morning, I could have left so much unfinished business in life. And, to an extent, that is going to happen in every death. But I, and so many of us I'm sure, leave unfinished business every day that was supposed to have been taken care of that day... or yesterday... or last week... or a few years ago.

Sometimes, you need to step out of your comfort zone and take a risk for a godly reason.

Today.

You may not have tomorrow.

Why do I assume that my life is less frail now at age 29 than it will be thirty years from now? Whether you live for 100 years or 50 years or 29 years or a couple of days, it all is infinitesimally small compared to ETERNITY.

And the close closes provide us with great reminders of such timeless truths.