My first car wreck...ever. Plus its aftermath.

Well, here's the long awaited (by me) posting about the 'wreck' I had yesterday. I was on my way from my job interview at Black and Decker to the mall to turn in an application at Journeys. It had been raining all day of course. It's a funny thing because I was thinking earlier that day about how much busier the police must be with car accidents on rainy days. There were two just on the way from my house to the interview. But then I became one.

A person two cars up from me turned without their blinker, so the person in front of me slammed on her brakes. I, obviously, had to put my brakes on, too, but they didn't quite work right. My car skidded and would not stop. I tried pumping the brakes like they taught us in driver's ed, but to no avail. I also tried turning enough to miss the car ahead, but that also did not work seeing as that would have put me in the way of oncoming traffic. In the end, I just broke the plastic on my front right headlight and scratched some paint of her bumper. I guess I did pretty well in improving the situation under the circumstances, though, because I did not hit her very hard. I'm pretty sure it was more mellow that a bumper car at the fair. Now let me make something clear, and I'm not just saying this. I was neither going too fast nor following too closely. It was simply the brakes along with the rain that caused this little problem. Also, there was nothing wrong with my brakes. Any car can skid on a wet road.

Well we called the police and waited for a little over half an hour until they came and said that we could just exchange insurance information and not be given a ticket. So we exchanged information...yada yada yada.

Now this is all fine and dandy until we get a call from their insurance company telling us that she is filing an injury claim. This 20 year old girl and I sat there and had a conversation for half an hour while waiting for the police. We even discussed the fact that there were no injuries because we were saying it would be horrible if it was a worse accident and someone was hurt and they took that long to show up. I hope she is not hurt badly. If she is hurt, I hope she recovers quickly and we can work it all out.

Giving her the benefit of the doubt, maybe the injury did not show up until later. At first I just assumed 100% that she was lying, but a friend helped me to see that that's NOT the only possibility. I mean, she seemed like a nice enough girl. I suppose I don't know the whole situation. I'll just have to wait and find out. I really need to get better about jumping to conclusions. This type of thinking violates several principles set forth in I Corinthians 13: Love suffers long and is kind, does not behave rudely, does not seek its own, rejoices in the truth, endures all things, etc. I also need to take a closer look at how to judge with righteous judgement and how not to judge with unrighteous judgement. I've always had a problem with that, but I'm going to start working on it.

Tomorrow, I'm going to their insurance claims office to have pictures taken of the 'damage' to my car. Please pray that I can get it all worked out alright.

So what's the moral of this story? Even if something is an accident or not directly your fault, there are still consequences. In a religious sense, sinning on accident is still a sin that will separate you from God. Take, for instance, the story of Uzzah. (II Samuel 6:1-8) The ark was being brought to Jerusalem and, instead of carrying the ark, it was put on a cart. There was a command for no one to lay hands on the ark of the covenant. While it was being moved, the oxen stumbled, and the ark began to fall. Uzzah reached out to protect the ark, touched it, and was struck dead. Sincerity is not enough to please God, and many today are sincere in what they do and truly believe they are following God, but are still wrong (Matthew 7:21-23). So what do we do about it? How do we know that what we are doing is right if there is so much deceit in the religious world? Study God's Word over man's. Study and re-study to make sure that the things you are told are truly what God intended and have not been altered by the teachings of men.

I know this is long. I'll try to make them shorter in the future!

Sleep tight! Don't let the bedbugs bite! :)

~Bef