God Is Greater Than Our Statistics

  It has been absolutely beautiful in the Mississippi delta these last few days.  The combines harvesting soybeans have given away to the cotton-pickers picking… well, cotton.  Farmers have their eye on the prize.  After eight months of dark to dusk, can ’til can’t labor, they can see that moment on the horizon when that last row will make its way into the picker, and the last bale will head to the gin.  Then it will be a few months of kicking back, putting their feet up, and… working on equipment, land forming, replacing irrigation, negotiating prices, planning what to plant for 2012, borrowing money to plant, paying bills, filling out government paperwork, etc, etc, etc…. 

   For all of us the economic picture still remains pretty dicey.  But, never fear, the government is on top of it all.  Carefully analyzing and measuring every minute move.  Every afternoon you can hear a new statistic or two carefully crafted by The Federal Bureau of Statistics concerning our GDP, unemployed, employed, never employed, factory orders, and “misery index.”  (How would you like to be that guy?  “Hey, Tim… we want you to find out exactly how miserable people are.”) 

  They are good.  For instance, they know there are 13, o92 knives, forks, and spoons in the White House.  (For a family of four?  Does someone have to report it when Obama bends one using it for a screwdriver?).  They know that 24% of us didn’t make our bed this morning… 5% never do.  They know we husbands do 29% of laundry (somewhere)… which is about 30% more than with which most wives are comfortable… only 7% trust their husbands to do the laundry.  Rockers, crooners, and balladeers… 80% sing in the car; which is interestingly close to the number (88%) who use their blinkers.  Huh?  45% believe in ghosts, 49% believe in ESP, and 10% believe in the 10 commandments… (there might be a problem here).   It is reported that 43% of us will be in religious services this week, but I think they must have asked the preachers for that count.  The city with the highest number of TV evangelist… Washington D.C.  The percentage of people who hear God talking to them… 36%.    44% reuse tinfoil, 57% gift paper.  The ever vigilant federal government has determined that 39% have peeked in their host’s bathroom cabinet; and 17% have been caught. 

    Internationally, 20% of the world’s population live in China; 30 % of these Chinese adults live with their parents… 200 million Chinese live on less than a $1 a day.  Finally, thanks to the ever diligent folks in the federal government, you’ll be glad to know you are more likely to be killed by a donkey than a plane crash, by a poison plant rather than poison chemicals, and you are 6 times more likely to be struck by lightning than by a woman… but don’t press your luck.

  Isn’t it nice to know that the government is so diligently seeking keeping tabs on the economoy, the unemployed, our safety, etc….

  Not so fast!!!

  This came to light last month in the Washington Post and the Chicago Tribune.  It seems at the Office of Personnel Management they have a problem… have been for at least five years.  It seems this lauded federal agency has seen a 70% rise in th number of federal employess receiving bogus pension checks.  A problem which is in itself problematic.  What’s more?  The reason the checks are bogus?  The recipient is dead!  That’s right.  Not only are they paying retirement pensions to people who are dead… there is enough data on this issue to track the rise and fall of deceased recipients for the past five years.

  Of course other agencies are outraged.  How could they do that?  How inept the bookkeeping.  We need better communication!  You won’t find a problem like that at the Social Security Administration… yes, the ones keeping the books on all that money for our old age.    No way… they cut the benefits to all there deceased pensioners last year; including 14,000 who were still alive!  Okay, I can see how someone misplaced the information that said someone died, hence their pension kept going out, but how do you mistakenly classify someone as dead?   (Don’t you know those folks are reading the fine print in any effort to balance the budget.)

    It can make you a little nervous.  But, before you get too antsy, take heart.  Your parents don’t need an accounting office to take care of their children.  No one had to count when you get in the car just to verify that everyone is there.  If they leave you at church, that is soon recognized and resolved.  Your parents know you… and so does your Heavenly father.   He “knows the numbers of hairs on your head” paints one image.  “Not one sparrow falls without your Father’s knowledge, and you are much more important than they,” Jesus adds.  Perhaps my favorite image, however, comes from Revelation 7.  The angels are poised to pour out God’s fury on the Roman Empire; ready to bring judgement.  “Wait,” comes the cry from God.  “Hold up,” he says, ”while I number all my people… I want to keep a watch over them.”  Later there is a great crowd standing before God.  “Who are they?,” it is asked.  “These are my people, the ones I numbered, not a one was deserted or left behind, I watched over them all and now they all made it through.”  It is quite an image, and quite an assurance of those struggling to keep their head up.

David shares similar sentiment in that psalm which is at one time both the ultimate haunt of all those who live their life outside of God, and the abiding comfort of all those who know him…

    Oh Lord you hve searched me… and you know me.  You know me when I sit and when I rise; You perceive my thoughts from afar…. Where can I go from you Spirit?  Where can I go from your presence?  If I go up to the heavens you are there; if a grave be where I make my bed you are there.  If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of the sea, even there your hand will guide me, your right hand will hold me.  If I say, “Surely the darkness will hide me and the light become night around me,” even the darkness will not be dark to you; the night will shine like the day, for darkness is as light to you….”  Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts.  See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.  (excepts from Psalm 139)

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