If you, Lord, were to note what is done amiss,
O Lord, who could stand? – Psalm 130:2
Selective enforcement.
Today on my after-breakfast walk, kitty-corner from the DMV, I came upon four police officers and two municipal workers watching over a street parishioner who was stuffing his belongings into two big black garbage bags. The street parishioner was being rousted by the enforcement of the sit-lie law.
Also on my walk, I saw a vehicle make an improper left turn. I saw a prosperous-looking dad on one of those expensive, kid-toting bicycles, pedaling down the south pedestrian path of the Panhandle, the path that’s clearly and repeatedly marked “No Bicycles. No Skating.” I saw several dogs walking or running free, their owners paying no mind to the leash law that governs all of the Panhandle.
I reckon that most of us, perhaps all of us, have benefited from selective enforcement. Have you ever driven over the speed limit and not received a warning or a ticket?
In the cosmic, catholic scheme of things, we benefit from God’s selective enforcement. The psalmist notes this plainly – if God chose to enforce every transgression of ours, we’d be done for.
We are called to do as much in our dealings with one another. Our lives would be miserable if our loved ones pointed out and punished us for everything we do wrong – let the one without sin, Jesus said to the enforcement-minded crowd, cast the first stone.
What do you choose to note? What do you choose to let go?
God’s blessings and peace,
Dan +
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