The Manual

The best financial investment of my life was buying a Honda Fit. This is about my initial journey with her, from June 16, 2010.

I'm going on my first trip this weekend in my new Honda Fit. It may seem silly to you but I've never made a trip in a new car so I'm pretty excited. The big occasion is the Saturday wedding of my nephew, Ben Hawley, to his stunningly beautiful bride-to-be, Courtney Jenson. The celebration will take place in Henryetta, Oklahoma, more than four hundred miles away from Houston. I'll leave before 6 AM Friday and hope to arrive by mid-afternoon. In the ten weeks that I've owned my Honda, I've only put eight hundred miles on the odometer so it is still in the breaking in stage. Now that I am commencing on this inaugural voyage, I thought it would be good if I learned a little bit about my new vehicle so I took the owner's manual out of the glove compartment. It's amazing what you can find in those 345 pages! For example, on page 69, I found out how to reset the MPG gauge! To learn how to fold down the rear seats, I simply turned to page 97. There's even a thirty page section entitled, 'If The Unexpected Happens.' I do not expect the unexpected with a new car...but you never know!

When I pull out of Houston in thirty six hours, that owner's manual will be with me. Wouldn't it be foolish to leave it here? I mean, who knows more about the 2010 Honda Fit than the maker! It has the answers for the questions that will come with use. Obviously, it won't cover every possible scenario but it gives me guidelines to make my experience with it safe, productive, and enjoyable. I should have perused it before, but like many of us, I waited until I needed it! Pretty easy to see some parallels here, isn't it? The Bible is the manual the Maker gave us but we often leave it unopened and go to it only in emergencies. It knows how we were designed and created and under what circumstances we can thrive. It has practical advice for daily living and stories to show us how to handle the unforeseen situations that define life. We're comfortable enough to know it's there if we need it so we take it for granted until..... we're in trouble or there's a calamity or fill in your own blank. Then, when the ship has been righted, we return it to the glove compartment of our lives. What a shame- it can make our journey through live smoother and bearable and accurate. My Honda Fit did not come with a GPS to chart the path to my final destination, but my Bible does. It just doesn't give me the time of arrival.

Applicable quote of the day:
"And I, I took the road less traveled by. I was using a GPS system.''
Robert Brault

God bless,
Steve
Luke 18:1
www.hawleyboos.com
E-mail me at steve@hawleybooks.com