“Preaching Safety”

The sleek car charged down the track.  Everything looked good from the starting line as the car roared down the asphalt.  As the car sailed through the finish line things changed.  Within a blink of an eye the car veered right and slammed head first into the guardrail.  The car twisted and flew over the railing.  With nothing to contain the car it tumbled out of control through the field.  Flipping over and over again the car bounced and spiraled until coming to rest upside-down in the dirt.  What looked like a great run had suddenly turned horribly bad.

            This is when a good day at the race track becomes a very somber day.  This is not only true for the driver of the car that wrecked, but for everyone who is there.  No one wants to see this happen, much less be a part of it. 

            But this story is a little different than most.  It is a story about preparation.  You see the driver of this car had done several things ahead of time to be prepared for things that might happen to him at the race track.

            First he had done things right with the car.  It not only met all of the safety requirements for the speed his was going to be running, but it exceeded those standards in many areas.  You see, he had planned ahead and over built the car.  His chassis builder had welded together a fine car with great attention paid to details and construction.  The funny car cage they had installed would prove to be worth every penny he spent on it since it was completely intact when the car stopped.

The safety features did not stop there.  He wore a quality firesuit that fit him well.  The suit was clean and tear free which is not always the case when you look around the staging lanes of a track.   And the abuse of such an immense impact would have destroyed many cheaper helmets.   As part of his preparation, this driver had made the choice to buy a really good quality helmet.  It had some dents and dings after the accident, but remained fully intact.

Everything in this race car worked as designed; the chassis, seat belt harness, helmet and everything else.  I know from my standpoint that no one ever wants to test the safety features in their car, but sometimes things do not go as planned.

Now you might think that I am saying this driver had planned on crashing, that he had made preparations for an accident.  But what I am saying is that he had made preparations for living.  Many people do not take the take time or do not want to spend the money to do things right when it comes to the safety aspect of their race cars.  “Safety stuff doesn’t make a car go faster, so why spend the money?”   Maybe you have heard that complaint, maybe that complaint came from you.  I want you to think about your preparation and if you are preparing for living.

             But that is not all there is to this story.  I talked about what he had done to prepare the car and the safety equipment he had purchased, but there was more.  The biggest thing that he had done before climbing into the race car was getting his life prepared for an accident.  His wife knew that he loved her; he told her that as he buckled into the car.  The same is true of his family.  And the most important part of preparing his life was having things right with God before he set foot into the car.  That is something that many people have not taken the time to do.  Many people don’t see the need or they think that they will have time to do that later.  For this driver, having a second chance may not have been an option.

            Now this story has a happy ending.  While he was injured in the crash, he was not killed.  It will be a while before he is fully recovered, but what is so wonderful is that he will recover.  I want everyone to learn from this young man and understand that no matter the outcome of his crash he had taken the time to be prepared.

Ken Webb