Christian Living

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Being in my extremely late 20’s (I am 35), I even surprised myself that I was being drawn toward the machine. The flashing and frolicking lights, the carnival sounds, the promise of victory were all more enticing than I thought they could possibly be. I found it odd that a grown man like me would be drawn by the crane machine at a Shoney’s, but sure enough, I was hooked. Like a moth to the bug zapper, I floated blissfully toward the machine with visions of a stuffed Sylvester the Cat or Marvin the Martian bouncing around inside my semi-vacant head cavity.
I started trying to vanquish the machine with plan A... get a roll of quarters. Surely I could practice hard and with sheer will and an ever increasing talent, the stuffed friend would be mine. Clank...dangly, bingly....bzzzzzzzz. Over and over, I tried, over and over the bzzzzz of failure. I took a deep breath, now glowing like a stuck pig, and manhandled the crane joystick. Surely effort will guarantee my prize. Bzzzzzzz! Not even a dust bunny!
Plan B... I would be kind to the machine. I fetched a squirter of Windex and turtle wax and proceeded to pridefully clean the machine. Maybe if I cleaned the machine and my hands as I did it, the machine would voluntarily hand over at least a Tweety keychain! I treated it like a lucky Buddha and rubbed its belly with sweet smelling Spring Bouquet glass cleaner. Surely I would impress the machine and it would hand over the prize! Bzzzzzzzz!
Plan C. I would use logic and science to force the machine to release its loot. I carefully measured the hypotenuse of the right circle with my swiss-made protractor/slide rule and discovered the precise method of gaining my stuffed buddy. With the focus of a toddler on an Easter egg, I measured distances and worked the math. To my prideful amazement, bzzzzzz. I wasn’t ever that good with math anyway.
Last resort...Plan D! I would wait until someone else played then compare myself to them...you know...appeal to the machine’s sense of fairness. A six year old girl walked up to the machine and said to her parent “Dad, I love this machine! Isn’t it wonderful? Maybe I will play it.” She read the rules with her mother’s help. They were simple. It even explained exactly how to win. All you have to do is love the machine, obey some easy instructions and ask and you win! She got a prize on the first quarter! I shoved her out of the way and said sternly to the machine “Hey, you gave her a prize despite all of my carefully devised plans! I worked for you...I did things for you... all she did is loved you and you gave her the prize?” The machine said Bzzzzzzzz and shut off.
Grace is like that, fellow seekers. God want us to love Him, follow a few simple rules, and believe in Him. We want to make up all sorts of ways of getting to Him and His prize while ignoring His plans for us. He seeks a love relationship with us that are bigger than rules, bigger than our effort, bigger than anything we can do ourselves. I know it seems too good to be true and difficult to fathom. Why would the Creator of the universe care for you or me? You might also think “I am more skilled at the crane than others...He has to give me a prize! I have found that He has a plan for all of us that is so easy a six year old can figure it out. He wants to give you for free the prize that you can’t buy or earn. Ephesians 2: 8-9(NIV) puts this game in proper prospective saying “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— not by works, so that no one can boast.” Trust and love God through His Son Jesus and the prize is yours (See John 3:16). Trusting in yourself is just a waste of quarters.

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