I blame insomnia, but the reason doesn't matter. The point is that after staying up until almost 7AM earlier in the week, since then I've been getting to bed later and later each successive night. Which helps explain why I was up and awake, fidgeting, and badly craving a Diet Coke at 1:10 AM tonight.
My tiny 12-volt fridge is empty, but then there's a drink machine in the middle of the marina, outside the Rec Room and office. So I counted the change in my pocket, grabbed a rain coat and headed down the dock.
And I tried not to remember or think too much about the clock.
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Rain had been falling off and on for most of the night, so at that hour of the night the Promenade along the waterfront was completely deserted. I saw a few lights left on in the windows of condos adjoining the marina but I didn't see a single person along the way, not even one.
The quiet and almost complete stillness didn't stop me from thinking what I'd do if the situation suddenly changed ... and things got seriously very serious.
What if the wide shadow behind the next bush suddenly jumped up and turned into a knife-wielding assailant? After all, we've had 158 murders (that's two every three days) in the city already this year.
Sure, I was on Def-Con 4 Situational Code Red High Alert looking out for bad guys all the way to the Coke machine and back ... but if bad guys had showed up, how could I explain why a Diet Coke was soooo important at 1:15 AM that I left my boat (and the security of surveillance cameras and an electronically locked gate) to get one?
"Bad guys showed up at my boat at 1:10 AM, climbed on board with weapons, fought their way inside, handcuffed my wrists behind my back, threw a bag over my head ... and then forced me at gun point to walk to the machine and buy myself two Diet Cokes"?
How about "Walking to the machine in the middle of the night to find a drink machine was an accident?" or "I have a right to do anything I want to at any time of day or night at any place I want"?
Don't all those excuses sound dumb, selfish or both?
Then why do we think those lame excuses work when we use them to rationalize and explain our sins?
The real reason I left my boat at 1AM to go grab a Diet Coke was because I wanted to.
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I didn't mean to tell a lie
It was an accident that I fell in love with a married man/woman
I didn't wake up thinking about stealing from my employer
My girlfriend got pregnant by accident
He/She's not a believer, but nobody chooses who they fall in love with
Looking back, everything just happened so fast
I never planned on letting my debt getting out of hand
I lost my temper by accident
... It just happened.
But those are all lies.
The truth is that Bad Guys didn't show up and snatch you out of bed this morning, threaten you or your loved ones at gun point and force you to sin.
And neither is it the truth that six months ago you tripped over your shoe laces at work and stumbled into an adulterous affair as a result. Just as it's true that slipping on a banana peel can't explain stealing, lying ... or rationalize a secret porn addiction.
--
Sin is never an accident.
The hollowness of every justification we dream up to squirm our way out of our sins and the consequences of our choices offers a pretty clear indication of how much faith we put in ourselves and how little faith we put in Christ.
Our excuses, no matter how sympathetic or reasonable they sound to our ears, only reveal how convinced we are of our ability to deceive God ... and how deluded we are that we can double-talk The Creator into looking the other way.
At least until the shadow of evil jumps out of the bushes, and life suddenly gets seriously very serious.
