“Whatever people expect, they soon come to think they have a right to:
the sense of disappointment can, with very little skill on our part, be turned
into a sense of injury.” - Screwtape, Senior Tempter, Hell. (The Screwtape Letters, C.S. Lewis)
“An unfriendly person pursues selfish ends and against all sound judgment
starts quarrels.” Proverbs 18:1
One night in Santa Barbara, I met
a partner at a 7-11 for a cup of coffee. We got our caffeine fix and stood outside
the front door of the store next to my police car. We talked for a few minutes
and a woman pulled up in a car next to where we stood.
I could see that in the back seat was an orange, 2 ½ foot tall “A” frame sign
printed front and back with the words, “City of Santa Barbara - No Parking.” These
signs are used to create temporary no parking areas for special events, road
work and such. Now it looked to me like this woman “borrowed” the sign from the
City to create her own personal “No Parking” space when she needed it. I was
looking into her car trying to figure out why she would have the sign in the
first place and she saw me staring.
“Can
I help you?” she asked with sarcasm halfway to the front door.
“Yes,
where did you get that sign?”
“It
was a gift.”
“A
gift? From who?” This was getting interesting.
“From
someone who is with the city LONGER than YOU!!!” She was winding up and clearly
irritated that I would dare to ask such a question.
Now
here was a person who was skirting the rules and got caught. I knew it. She
knew it. It was now a game to see how I could get the sign out of the car.
“You
can’t have that.” I said in very matter of fact tone.
She
started to argue and insisted that the sign was given to her.
“You
can’t have that.” I repeated the statement.
“What
do you want me to do? Give YOU the sign?” Sarcasm dripped from her words.
“Yes.”
She
walked back to her car and started a verbal barrage about how this was unfair,
how she had a “right” to the sign and expressed her general distain for city
employees. She unlocked the car, took the sign out and handed it to me.
“Thanks.”
I said. I opened my trunk, put it in and continued to drink my coffee.
The
woman was really mad now. She was yelling as she walked into the store. The
door closed behind her and while I could not hear her words, it was clear that
she continued to yell as she walked to the Slurpee machine. People inside
stopped what they were doing and watched the unhappy tax payer. My partner
suggested it was time to go.
I
got in my car and backed out to leave. The woman sees me leaving; bolts from
the back of the store, past the cashier, shoves open the front doors and yells,
“WHY DON’T YOU GO EAT A DOUGHNUT!”
I
laughed as I drove away.
The sad reality was that this
woman believed she had a right to this sign. Who was I to question her
possession of it? It does not take long working as a peace officer to figure
out that people who break the law are, for the most part, driven by selfish
ambition. Galatians 5:19-21 puts selfishness in perspective: “The acts of the
flesh are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity and debauchery; idolatry and
witchcraft; hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition,
dissensions, factions and envy; drunkenness, orgies, and the like. I warn you,
as I did before, that those who live like this will not inherit the kingdom of
God.”
Considering that selfish ambition falls into the same category as
extreme as witchcraft on one end and
as innocuous as discord on the other,
it is clear to me that all have sinned and fallen short of the kingdom of God.
(Romans 3:23) While it is not likely that we will face a judge for the choices
we make, the truth is that we will all have to answer for the No Parking Signs we have a in the back
seat of our cars. There is no break we can get from a cop, no court that can
issue a stay and no amount of time spent in a prison cell to escape eternal judgment. Forgiveness
is only found at the foot of the cross.
Mark 10:32-34, “They were on their way up to Jerusalem, with
Jesus leading the way, and the disciples were astonished, while those who
followed were afraid. Again he took the Twelve aside and told them what was
going to happen to him. ‘We are going up to Jerusalem,’ he said, ‘and the Son
of Man will be delivered over to the chief priests and the teachers of the law.
They will condemn him to death and will hand him over to the Gentiles, who will
mock him and spit on him, flog him and kill him. Three days later he will rise.’”
