Santa's Down!

Approximately six years ago, a kind woman in our church family passed down to us an eight-foot tall blow-up yard Santa.  Ever since then, Santa has stood tall in the Hudson yard throughout the Christmas season.  After eating lunch one day, I backed out of my driveway and pulled up to the stop sign on the east side of our home.  As I rolled past the sign, I heard a huge boom.  It totally mimicked the percussion of a 12-gauge scattergun!  The blow startled me in such a way that I stopped the car and looked around to see if I could determine its origin.  When I looked over my left shoulder, I immediately noticed that Santa was going down.  My first thought was “Santa’s down!”  What kind of sicko would shoot my yard Santa? 

As Santa slipped to the ground, I threw the car into reverse and returned to my driveway.  When I got out of my car, I noticed that the electricity was off at my home.  That is when I realized that the transformer had blown down the alley from our storage building.  Santa was not taken down in a blaze of glory, but had just lost power.  I felt like an idiot.  My initial thought was an erroneous assumption.  I got all lathered up for nothing.    

What does the Bible say about jumping to conclusions?  In Proverbs 18:2 Solomon wrote, “A fool has no delight in understanding, but in expressing his own heart.”  Let me ‘Artie that up’ for you a little bit.  It is foolish to speak your mind without first gaining understanding.  I constantly remind myself that my fleshly heart is proud, so I must humble myself and investigate the facts before I shoot off my expert mouth.  Save your self some frustration and pain and investigate the facts before you plunge into an assumption.