Don’t Lose Your Head

In God I trust; I will not be afraid;

What can man do to me? (Psalm 56:11)

I’m reminded of one of the reasons I don’t see a lot of television lately. It’s mostly because it sucks me in and all of a sudden I realize that I’ve just given away a half hour . . . or an hour . . .  or more that I just can’t get back. And it’s given me nothing to show for it. 

The tv is on in the background now, weaseling my attention away. I’ve just seen two completely unrelated incidents of people losing their heads. 

Literally. 

Sort of.

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The first instance was an episode of Punk’d.  A guy got on a bus and his head fell off into his hands. But it was ok. He put it back on his shoulders and staggered to the back of the bus. Where his head fell off again. When the bus finally stopped, a whole bunch of people ran screaming from the bus. 

Somehow, his fellow passengers couldn’t get their heads around the idea that real heads don’t fall off and still permit folks to walk around holding them.

Talk about losing your head.

Then, a few moments later, a commercial came on for a headache reliever. To demonstrate how much her head hurt, the lady in the ad ripped her head off (not in a bloody way, just as though tearing paper). And then she stood in the produce aisle casually holding a torn off picture of her head telling us how she was affected by light and sound.

All the while, a torn hole in the video gaped at the viewer reminding us that her head was missing.

People keep losing their heads.

And they make it look so easy.

Almost commonplace.

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I don’t think it’s supposed to be like that. I think we’re supposed to keep our heads. 

Paul told Timothy that God didn’t give him a spirit of fear, but one of a sound mind (2 Timothy 1:7). And here the psalmist reminds us that man is powerless to do us real harm. Nor can anything else for that matter.

Does it mean nothing bad ever happens?

Hardly. 

I’m pretty sure we’ve all see enough of life to know better. Bad things happen. But God stays with us no matter what. With Him, we can persevere. We can hold on. We can keep our heads.

Stuff happens. 

But it’s no reason to lose our heads.

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