With my dogs pulling me on their leashes like we were an Iditarod sled team, we rounded the street corner towards the house. That’s when the car’s headlights almost blinded me in the early morning darkness.
Not recognizing the vehicle, I assumed the driver to be an interloper in our neighborhood. Whomever it was, they were making a beeline towards my two Schnauzers and me. “Stop,” I automatically yelled, trying unsuccessfully to pull my dogs back. The driver couldn’t hear my frantic plea with the car’s windows up. And that’s when I caught a glimpse of the driver. She was looking down at her cell phone.
You’ve read about the dangers: being on your cell phone while driving reduces your attention by 37%; it causes 1.6 million crashes every year; the chances of an accident occurring once a driver takes their eyes off the road increases by a staggering 400%.
People know it’s dangerous, yet they still do it, somehow convincing themselves they are the exception to the rule. They’re like, “I’m gifted and talented at texting while driving. I’ve got this.” Statistics prove otherwise.
Fortunately for my dogs and me, the driver looked up from her cell phone in the nick of time, jerking her car to her right, just a few feet from us. I glowered at the car’s rear lights as they passed by, as if that would signal my displeasure with the driver. Back at the house, I told Lori about our close call: “I can’t believe how negligent people are, driving while on their cell phone,” I complained.
Then, several hours later, I was getting in my car for my commute to teach a class. Once again, I rushed back into the house, having forgotten something. That’s not unusual for me, only this time I was late.
I sped up once I had driven out of my neighborhood. That’s when I heard a ding on my cellphone. I couldn’t resist looking down to see who was texting me. I looked up just in time to miss hitting a squirrel jig-sawing across the road.
I could imagine the squirrel scampering safely to its nest. “Momma, it happened again. Some guy was looking down at his cell phone while I was gathering our breakfast nuts. Had it not been for my quick instincts and dexterity, I wouldn’t be here to feed this family.”
It’s true: we get disgusted about others doing the very things we do.
The squirrel reminded me of that.
Jesus addressed our problem like this: “And why worry about a speck in your friend’s eye when you have a log in your own? How can you think of saying to your friend, ‘Let me help you get rid of that speck in your eye,’ when you can’t see past the log in your own eye? (Matthew 7:3-4).
I happen to have a variety of logs that blur my vision. This time it was my cell phone. I disdain people who drive while texting, but I’ve done the same thing myself. I get aggravated with people whose cell phones ring aloud while I’m giving a presentation, knowing that the same thing has happened to me when others have had the floor.
The trouble with most of us is that we are blind to whatever our log is. For some, it’s gossiping about others and calling it “prayer concerns.” For others, it’s secretly indulging in pornography while condemning their spouse for the lack of intimacy in their relationship. Then some attend church solely for social reasons while chastising nonattenders. The list is as endless as our hypocrisies are varied, multiplying like the gnats in your kitchen window on a hot summer day.
But the heaviest logs are carried by those who insist they have none. Those are the ones whose blindness is so ingrained that it prevents them from an eye-opening, honest-to-God look in the mirror.
That’s because seeing yourself in the mirror can be a shocking revelation.
Especially when you have to look away from the cell phone in your hand to see yourself.