Miracle (and other overused words)

I guess we all have pet peeves. One of mine is people overusing or misusing words. I think if I hear one more person on TV describe something as surreal, I'll gag. I doubt that any of them has ever looked up the word in the dictionary. Likewise with "hero" and "miracle." Don't get me wrong, I believe there are heroes, and I do believe in miracles. But I usually cringe when I hear such words used because they are used incorrectly. The sad thing is that we cheapen such terms by their overuse and misuse. Take for example the word "miracle." A true miracle is a supernatural phenomenon. That is, something that supersedes (I don't like the word violates) the laws of nature.

For example, the jet that "landed" in the Hudson River. The whole incident was dubbed by the news media as "The Miracle on the Hudson." I simply ask, "What law of nature was superseded?" When jet engines shut off, jet planes fall out of the sky. And that is exactly what this one did. Ah, but here is where we can correctly use the term "hero". The pilot used all his training and experience to do exactly what he was trained to do, glide that jet to a skidding landing. And he did so perfectly. Personally I believe God enabled him to do it. But still no laws of nature were superseded in the process. Had the plane kept flying without engines, then a true miracle would have occurred.

People--even Christian people--get angry with me for saying this. They think I'm robbing God of some glory by saying it was not a miracle. No, no. I give God all the glory. As I said, I believe it was God's good grace and providence that overshadowed Chesley Burnett "Sully" Sullenberger III, whether or not he acknowledges it (I haven't heard him say one way or the other, and that's not my point). All I'm saying is that no law of nature was superseded. These aircraft are made to float (if passengers don't panic and open doors, as was the case in this incident). So, even the fact that the plane didn't sink before every person was rescued is not a true miracle. But still an act of God's grace, none the less.

All I'm saying is that if we label things as miraculous when they are not, we cheapen the word and do God no favors. Finding my keys that I lost in the grass while mowing is not a miracle. It is an act of God's grace, perhaps in answer to my prayer, but no law of nature was overcome.

Raising the dead is a true miracle. So is walking on water, calming a violent storm with a spoken word, and multiplying a few small fish and biscuits to feed thousands. There are other examples in the Bible besides these (creation, incarnation, resurrection for example). I doubt that it will happen, but I sure hope that Christian people will not buy into the world's watered down, cheapened definition and use of the word miracle. Or the word hero.

My Good Deed

I was leaving the hospital, crossing the street, when an elderly woman pulled her car into the cross walk very close to me and asked where she was to go for surgery. She said she was looking for the front entrance. Spartanburg Regional has over a half dozen "front" entrances. The light changed, traffic began moving, I'm in the middle of the street and have not a clue where to send this woman. So, I pointed to a nearby driveway to one of the "front" entrances. She pulled away and I continued on to my car. Then my dear mother came to mind. I thought, "Why didn't someone come with that woman?!" I got my car and went to where I had sent her. She was sitting there in her car. I asked if anyone had helped her and she said, "No." Then I saw a security guard. I asked her to come see if she could help the lady. She told her where she needed to be, and fortunately I knew the place. I told the woman to follow me and I would take her to that "front" entrance. When we arrived at that area, another security guard was waiting for us with a parking place close to the door. She took control of the situation so I drove on. I didn't get to speak with the woman again, but I felt sure she would be taken care of. I think my mother is smiling down at me. I would have wanted someone to do as much for her.

Lowest of the Low

I have what some might consider a morbid hobby. I catalog old cemeteries, and locate graves by request. I am a member of FindAGrave.com. When someone requests a photo of a grave marker in a cemetery in my zip code, I get an email from FAG (I know, I don't like the acronym either). When I go to locate this grave, I often find damage by vandalism. I recently visited two vandalized cemeteries that particularly bothered me. One was in Cassville, Georgia (once the largest city between Nashville and Savannah, Cassville was the cultural center of North Georgia before the War Between the States. Read more here: http://www.notatlanta.org/cassville.html). The damage here was particularly heart breaking because of the unusually high number of Confederate soldiers buried here, including a general (for more look here: http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~mnwabcw/30.htm). The vandals cracked and broke in crypts. They turned over markers and large uprights. They marred, defaced, and defiled a sacred place. There must be an especially hot portion of hell for such wicked people.
The other vandalized cemetery I recently visited is Oakwood in Spartanburg, SC. This cemetery is majestic. There are huge monuments and family crypts and mausoleums. Obviously Spartanburg's elite and wealthy are buried here. But there is also a pauper's field, and even it was damaged. Again, the wicked pranksters upset and overturned huge obelisks and ornate stones, breaking many in the process. Besides the thousands of dollars it will take to cleanup and correct the damage, there is the theft of solitude and sanctuary, dignity and honor. Who would do such a vile thing? Animals do not behave this way. Only wicked, fallen, depraved, twisted, perverted, sinful human beings. I pray the guilty will confess their crime and seek forgiveness from God and the community, lest they die and enter eternity with this guilt upon them.
Here is one stanza from an old poem that expresses what I feel:
He sleeps ~ what need to question now
If he were wrong or right?
He knows, ere this, whose cause was just
In God the Father's sight.
He wields no warlike weapons now,
Returns no foeman's thrust ~
Who but a coward would revile
An honest soldier's dust?

O.P.T.

We're all familiar with the acrostic OPM. It's what all the financial gurus tell us will make us rich: Other People's Money. Well, it hasn't worked for me. But what I want to address is OPT. I have over 27 years of experience in this matter. And quite frankly, I'm sick to death of it. We own property in Cherokee County, Georgia, which we visit about twice a year. While there one thing that I have done on every visit home since 1983 is take two huge plastic bags and pick up all the trash that people have thrown out on my property. Other People's Trash (OPT). Almost daily here in SC I pick up trash thrown out of passing cars onto the church property. Almost every Sunday morning I pick up beer cans or bottles. I don't know what goes through the minds of those who do this, whether is it ignorant thoughtlessness or maliciousness. After dinner last evening my wife and I went for a walk at a private garden that is open to the public. It is beautiful and lush, but kept up by volunteers. As we came to the center, there were four muddy napkins on the ground. It appeared that someone stepped off the path and got their shoes muddy. So they produced these four napkins and cleaned off their shoes, but just left the napkins there on the ground. Why? Do such people think the world is their trash can? In the 27 years we have owned the property in Georgia, I must have picked up a ton of beer and soda cans or bottles, along with fast food bags, Wal-Mart bags, household garbage, you name it. If I threw any of this in the yard of any one of those persons, they would probably want to fight me over it. I've never done anything to them, yet they not only feel free to trash my personal property, but all along the road above and below my property as well. When God created man (Adam) and placed him in the pristine garden (earth), He commanded him to keep the garden, not to trash it. Yet trash it is exactly what man has done. I just don't get it. Why can't people dispose of their trash properly? Did I mention dirty baby diapers dropped in parking lots? Or chewing gum spit all over public sidewalks? OPT, I hate it.

Dandylions

Just who decided that dandylions are weeds? I've been down on my knees for three days digging these things out of my lawn before they bloom, and there are about a million left yet. If we just all decided that they are beautiful and very desirable, then we wouldn't have to waste all this time fighting them. Some folks go the poison route. That is more expensive and more harmful to the environment (but less harmful to the knees!). Some people eat the greens, I'm told. But I have neighborhood dogs who use my yard as their potty, so I think I'll pass on the salad, thank you. Now, where did I put that liniment?

Help, Help, I'm Speeding & Cannot Stop!

Let's be totally honest here. I can understand an 80 yr old getting confused in a parking lot and jabbing the gas instead of the brake. But a 61 yr old on an interstate who can call 911 and when told to shift to neutral replies that he can't do that and hold the phone at the same time. Gimme a break. I'm 60+ also and have driven for a long time, including a number of vehicles. In fact, I own a Toyota (albeit not a Prius). The first and most important thing anyone learns when beginning to drive is how to stop. You hit the brake, right. And if the brakes don't work for some reason (and in the old days they often didn't), you slowly (or even quickly as the case may dictate) pull up or step on the "emergency" brake (now called the parking brake). If that doesn't work, and if you haven't done so already, switch off the engine. Now, that means your power equipment will fail. Your windows won't roll down, your GPS may go blank, and your steering may be hard as the dickens. But there will be no more power to the drive train. Period!

Now one lady testifying before congress said she did all that, but her Prius kept accelerating. In fact, this lady said she did something that I don't believe. She said she put the car into reverse and nothing happened. Again, I don't know about this Prius, but most cars with automatic transmissions will not go into reverse while going 60 or 70 or 110 or whatever she claimed she was doing. There is a lock out mechanism. And if she managed to somehow override that and jammed that thing into reverse, either it would have a secondary fail safe mechanism that would have the same effect as putting it into neutral (no power to the drive train), or . . . she would go hurling through the windshield at the same velocity as the vehicle as the drive shaft twisted like a pretzel reversing direction.

But back to the 61 year old California man who can't talk on the cell phone and put the gear into neutral at the same time. When I first heard that story, I said to my wife: "I do not believe that for one second." And now, a lot of other people don't either. Hey, Toyota may have a problem with electronic peddles, and I surely don't want any vehicle that doesn't have mechanical gas and brake peddles (whose insane idea was that?), but they don't need people "piling on" and kicking them while they are down. The 61 year old California man who couldn't stop his car says he isn't going to sue Toyota, but he had a lawyer with him on TV, and lawyers only get involved in things like this for one reason, and it isn't public relations.

If Toyota has a problem, then they ought to fix it. If people have been hurt or killed, then Toyota ought to pay, if at fault. But if people are lying and making false claims for whatever reason, then they ought to be exposed and punished also.

Culture of Death

In last Sunday's Spartanburg Herald-Journal (Feb. 21, 2010) an Opinion Editorial by Susu Johnson called for SC state lawmakers to invest more state money for "family planning" because 75% of pregnancies are "unintended". Ms. Johnson says, "We support the S.C. Legislature's restoration of state funding for family planning services in FY 2011 because it is fiscally prudent and good for our state's economy to do so." Translation: "Let's kill more babies for the convenience of irresponsible and ignorant teens and adults."

If human beings want to behave like animals, then maybe we need to begin a state sponsored spaying and neutering program.