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Happenings around Antioch

You Can Run but You Cannot Hide

I learned pretty early on in my Christian walk that I could run from God but I could not hide. Like the time I decided to skip church one Wednesday night and watch television at my grandparent’s house. The only problem was, I really needed to have my glasses if I was going to watch TV, but I left them at home when I made the 2-mile drive over to Grandma’s. Why? Do you really have to ask why a 17-year-old who wears coke-bottle glasses because he’s blind as a bat would leave them at home when he’s driving through the neighborhood in the daytime? Have you forgotten how important it was to be cool when you were a teenager? It was important to me, too. And since I didn’t have a chance at being cool, I had to at least look cool! That didn’t work for me either, but I could still pretend, couldn’t I?

I headed home to collect my glasses. I slowed down just a little at the stop sign that was there just to test my skills at crossing from Grandma’s road to our road without having to tap the brakes more than once. Driving along, singing a song, and then I saw it. A blur of blue in my rear view. I couldn’t really tell what it was exactly, but I figured it wasn’t the northern lights, so I pulled over. A few seconds later, a sheriff’s deputy appeared at my door and I began to shake. I looked up and saw that his mouth was moving but I couldn’t hear what he was saying. My window! I rolled it down quickly and he said something again, but my ears had temporarily stopped working. He said it a third time, forcefully: “Get out of the car, sir!” I got out, half expecting him to slap some cuffs on me and drag me off to jail, since I had just had a wreck a few weeks earlier, a wreck that was my fault.

The sheriff’s deputy was asking me another question, and I didn’t answer because, once again, my  ears were refusing to work. The officer was beginning to think I was mute. And maybe blind. My glasses! He was asking about my glasses and why I wasn’t wearing them, and according to my license I was required by law to wear them. Did I know that I had run a stop sign back there, and did I know that I could be cited for driving without a license, and did I know that I had nearly run a car off the road? And suddenly I was in a time warp, and my first-grade teacher was saying, “Mark, did you know that it was wrong to hit Kip in the head?”

I was finally able to speak, and the sheriff’s deputy kindly served God’s purposes by giving me a ticket. I said “Yes, sir,” as he explained the consequences of my actions, and I said “Yes, sir,” as the DMV revoked my license for 60 days, and I said, “Yes, sir” as I paid my fine for running a stop sign.

The Bible says, “Your sin will find you out.” That’s for sure. I am thankful that the God who owns the universe governs my life. I can try to run from him, but I can never hide. He loves me too much to let me do that.