My Engine Blew Up!

I’ve mentioned before about my first car.  It was a 1979 Cutlass Oldsmobile.  We once fit nine people in it.  I do believe the periscope attachment came with a separate kit that I never received (insert sarcasm here).  All in all it was the perfect car to learn how to drive in.  I think I had a dent in it (some minor and some not so much) for every week I drove those few years I had the car.  Rocko (Its name) was a car of first car stories, which live in infamy within my family lore.

This story is one that I will probably never live down, though I’ve tried.  I’m guessing I’d only been driving about a year.  My parents were super awesome to bless me with the car, and every time I turned around it seemed that someone was checking the oil.  I didn’t know how to check oil, so I just assumed that all would be fine.  Until that fateful day when I drove the tank back from town and I saw smoke coming out of the engine, it never occurred to me that I would need to learn to check the oil.  I hate to be a dumb blonde stereotype here, because I don’t consider myself that and I hate those jokes, but in this moment I kind of reinforced that stereotype.  Sure I made it home for the vehicle to roll into the driveway.  Sure I was okay, but my Rocko was not.  It had died and we would need more than a hearse to get it out of my parents’ driveway.  Eventually the engine was replaced and I got the car back, but there was months that I was carless.

When it was discovered that the reason the engine had blown up, was because it had no oil in it I was in trouble. I claimed ignorance to all things car, which in all fairness wasn’t a legitimate excuse.  While I thought someone should have taught me these things, truthfully if I was going to take on the responsibility of a vehicle I should have taken the initiative to learn the basics.  I still maintain that instead of high schools making students learn how to build a bird house there should be a mandatory life skills class where kids learn how to change the oil and a tire.   

People often try to take the same ‘ignorance is bliss’ approach to life and the Bible.  But here is what the Bible says.

Hosea 4:6  (KJV)

⁶ My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge: because thou hast rejected knowledge, I will also reject thee, that thou shalt be no priest to me: seeing thou hast forgotten the law of thy God, I will also forget thy children.

2 Timothy 2:15 (NKJV)

¹⁵ Be diligent to present yourself approved to God, a worker who does not need to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.

2 Corinthians 2:11 (NKJV)

¹¹ lest Satan should take advantage of us; for we are not ignorant of his devices.

 

            All of this meaning, God doesn’t want you to be ignorant.  He wants you to study the Bible so that you can know what it says.  Ignorance is not an excuse that will stand before God on the day that you and I have to stand before Him and give an account for our lives.  He doesn’t want us destroyed but wants us to know or have knowledge of His words and His will. 

            How easy it is for people to twist the Word of God and present it just slightly off to ones who don’t know what the Bible really says.  God doesn’t want you to end up with your ‘engine blown up’ so to speak.  He wants us fully functioning where He has placed us.  He wants us filled with the knowledge of His will and His plan.  Think about that the next time you study the word of God.  Get knowledge where your lacking and don’t just assume that those around you will take care of things for you.

            Remember God has awesome plans for your life.  Get excited!