“I couldn’t repair your brakes so I made your horn louder.”

Now I can no more cite the reference for this quote than I can confirm half the stuff that circulates around the Internet as authentic. (I just heard from a serviceman who knows my penchant for Starbucks that my favorite company had allegedly turned down a request to provide coffee for the soldiers in Iraq because it strongly opposed the war effort. Of course the next day he found out the story was a hoax, and my Starbucks source affirmed that the company has always been in support of the troops there.)

But this one I just snatched out of cyberspace. I have no idea where it came from or who to credit for it, so if I’m violating someone’s right to ownership, I apologize in advance, but I can’t resist the pathetic, but accurate metaphor in the statement. Isn’t it just like human nature to compensate for one weakness by overdoing another? “I couldn’t repair your brakes so I made your horn louder.”

Suddenly, I see a whole society racing out of control, blaring its horn all the way. Of course, what good does that do? Inevitably you will hit something and come to a gruesome and painful stop. It’s a crash course with no direction — a foolish way to solve a problem. But don’t we live our lives a lot like this? Our brakes go out so we speed up, blowing our horns until we run into something.

One of the tragedies about this observation is that it reminds us that people are often blowing their horns but no one seems to be able to hear. Prisons are full of lives that crashed, and no one bothered to hear their horns blowing. Kids crash the same way. Some blow their horns, but it’s already too late.

The best way to avoid this kind of tragedy is to realize we were made for God. A life of purpose puts the brakes on our running out of control. Allowing time to worship and seek God helps us re-center ourselves on God’s purposes for our lives, and reconfirm our life-course. When we periodically stop for “checkups,” we can spot problems before they become dangerous. Worship, in other words, allows us to fix our brakes.

As I keep thinking along these lines, I suddenly can envision a serious head-on accident scene where two cars are tangled in twisted metal with little hope for the occupants. And in my ear, I can hear a horn stuck in the on position, signaling way to late, that at least one of these cars never got its brakes fixed. The horn is only useful when you can stop and do something about the situation. We need to set our purposes while we can. And don’t forget to check your brakes.