There's the disaster you see—and the disaster you don't see.  I'll let you decide which is worse. 

Walk with me down the cardo (main north-south street) of Beit She‘an, an ancient town at the intersection of the Jordan River and the Jezreel Valley.  As the paver blocks are angled (not to mention ancient) do watch your step. 

Notice the fluted stone columns and cornices.  Clearly this place was at one-time a classy neighborhood.   Then an earthquake in 679 AD all but leveled the town.   Talk about disaster!  But this city is also the site of another epic event, one that goes all the way back to the biblical era of King Saul. 

Saul was a good guy. 

• He dressed right.
• He talked right.
• He could sing the praise and worship choruses of his day with as much fervor as the next guy.
• He seemed like the real deal.

Yet time after time, he cut corners, spiritually.  He failed to wait for a sacrifice.  Failed to execute a king.  Took spoils he had been forbidden.  He murdered 85 priests!   When faced with the ultimate Philistine invasion, rather than consulting God, King Saul consulted a medium—a witch.

The very next day, on Mount Gilboa, King Saul lost his life (along with his sons).  The Philistines cut off his head and fastened his body to the walls of the city of Beit She'an.  What a gruesome ending for someone who seemed to be God's man.

Standing at that ancient site, just yards away from where Saul's body would have been spiked gave me pause.

You and I attend church Sunday after Sunday with folks who look right, dress right and talk right.  They sing all the worship choruses with gusto.   Perhaps most of them are as they profess to be—truly born again.  But some are not (the Bible tells us so).

What a horrible thing to reach the end of this life and the beginning of eternity—only to hear Jesus say, “Depart from me.  I never knew you.”

That would be the ultimate disaster. 

In the sixties and seventies they called it “white noise”--the background blanket of sound that relaxes some—and makes others more productive.  Then, The Sharper Image made it personal with their Sleep Sound Machine.
 
From Time.com comes a review of three background noise websites.  For starters, there's Coffitivity.com.  This site recreates the pleasant background sounds of a coffee shop.  Perfect for anyone who finds that atmosphere more conducive for work.  Coffitivity lets you dial in how much activity you want.  Choose from Morning Murmur, Lunchtime Lounge, or the more restful, University Undertones.
 
Noisli.com offers a huge array of background sounds you blend together for the perfect combination of relaxation or focus—depending on your mood: rustling wind, a crackling fire or passing train.  A user-selectable screen visual allows you to match what you hear with what you “see” emotionally.
 
MyNoise.net bases its sound palette on actual research and offers soundscapes specifically designed for health recovery, meditation, or just plain sound blocking.  The website automatically calibrates for your system's speakers and your personal hearing. 
 
Who knew there were so many toys for noise?
 
But in a sound-soaked society like ours, I'm wondering if more noise is what we really need.
 
Ecclesiastes 3:7 reminds us there's “a time to be silent.”  In Psalms 46:10 we're told, “Be still and know that I am God.” 
 
I submit that some of the world's most effective soundscapes are found in the 23^rd Psalm-- He makes me lie down in green pastures.  Can you hear the birds?  He leads me beside the still waters. Hear that peaceful trickle?
 
What you and I need is not more sound for the sake of noise…but peace for the sake of our souls.
 
You won’t get that online.  Only in God and His Word.

1.5 billion.  Dollars.

That's how much money is owed to the city of Chicago in unpaid parking and traffic tickets. Imagine one and half BILLION dollars!

A recent article in Chicago Magazine spelled out exactly what that kind of cash will buy. A creative number crunch suggests that 1.5 billion dollars is enough to buy 545.5 million Chicago style hotdogs (nearly two for every American). 

Those unpaid tickets could purchase 5,117 years' worth of school supplies for Chicago's kids.  Sick of potholes?  That money could also resurface 2,497 miles of Chicago's streets—about two thirds of all its streets!  Or if you'd rather, you could reconstruct 3.5 CTA rail lines.

But if you prefer to think big—really big—1.5 billion dollars would also buy you the 110 story Willis Tower--plus a 590,000 square-foot addition. 

All of this because people refuse to pay their tickets. The Pharisee-in-me is inclined to simultaneously label and lambaste these scofflaws.  How dare they cheat the government? But in pointing at others, we must beware the proverbial four fingers pointing back at ourselves:

• Do you and I pay our parking tickets?
• What about filing permits for home improvements?
• Do we get creative with numbers when filing our income tax?
• Do we dabble in deceit of any kind?

Amazing how comfortable I am pondering the scofflaws “out there” that owe a billion and a half, while overlooking my own moral debts.  I wonder if God were to actually show me the ledger how horrified I would be.

Romans 14:12, “Each one of us will give account of himself to God.”

In a recent CNN commentary, Fareed Zakaria (by his own admission not a Christian) made this assessment of Christianity: “its central message is simple and powerful: Be nice to the poor.”  Fareed ends with, “if you have a problem with this message…you have a problem with Jesus Christ.” The commentary makes a number of worthwhile observations.  Clearly, followers of Christ are called to care for “the least of these.”

However, to say that the message of Christ was mostly about loving and caring for the poor is to suggest that a visit to a steakhouse is mostly about the salad. Loving poor people and alleviating suffering of all kinds was certainly on the menu, but this was hardly the main course for Jesus. 

No question Jesus encouraged loving the poor and advocating their cause. To ignore them or exploit them is sin.  But as for the central message of Christianity, that is something much larger.  Jesus revealed it in Luke 19:10, “The Son of man has come to seek and to save that which was lost.”

In telling the world that He was fully God, fully able to seek and save, Jesus greatly offended the crowds (then and now).  Jesus said “I am the way, the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father but by me” (John 14:6).  He called Himself the exclusive way to heaven!

If the central message of Jesus was about being nice to the poor, he would surely not have ended up crucified with spikes driven through his hands and feet, his head bloodied and his body spat upon.   Clearly, His contemporaries understood His central message: “I am God.  You are all sinners in need of a Savior.  I am that Savior.  And by the way—there is no other.”  They did not crucify him for a central message of being nice to the poor!

I agree with Fareed that we have a moral obligation to be kind and generous to the disadvantaged.  Being nice to poor people is certainly a reflection of the character of the Christ.   But to reduce the central message of Christianity to “being nice to the poor” is not being nice to Jesus.  Or the truth.

If you have a problem with that, with due respect, you have a problem with Jesus Christ. 

If it's true that Chicago is the “city with big shoulders,” those shoulders get quite a work out.  Walking 1.5 miles each way to work, I'm continually amazed at the construction projects I encounter. 

There is no end to the pounding, grinding, bashing, welding, clanking—building.  On Wacker Drive, I see a major project underway that has most of the heavy equipment staged on the Chicago River.   

Worth noting: a huge red crane (the boom must be 50 feet tall or more) whose treads rest on massive timbers laid out on a barge.  Because I often take the same train, I witness the same early morning scenarios: workers grabbing their last few puffs on cigarettes before clocking in, heavy equipment dragged out of locked storage containers, and a symphony of swearing from red-scarfed heads. 

What has lately grabbed my attention is the daily ritual of the aforementioned crane's operator.   Day after day I find him climbing outside his cab with a jug of glass cleaner in one hand and a rag in the other.  Every morning, he faithfully spritzes the glass and wipes away the dust and grime that come with big noise and big toys. 

Apparently, it's “all that important” to him.  In a given day, he will hook, hoist, and haul hundreds of tons of materials—any of which could crush a site or kill a man, given the slightest imprecision on his part.  It's not that he “wants” to see clearly around him.  He must see.  So he cleans. Every morning.

And so must we. 

The windows of our souls are ever caked with dust and grime that come from a noisy life—sin. We little understand the loads we swing about us daily, the potential we face for immediate destruction.

How good to know that upon our confession, the Savior with big shoulders—Jesus—is ready and willing to forgive our sins and “cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”

How is it with the windows of your soul?