TITLE: The Lost Check By Matthew Lytle 06/05/05 |
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He grabbed his black ski mask, slipped on his University of Michigan varsity jacket, and made his way outside. He shut the door behind him, and jumped into his tan truck. He started the truck up, and drove. He was on his way to his town’s utility office.
About eight months ago, he sent them a check for his utility bill, but it got lost in the mail. They promised him that it would be shredded if ever found, but just two days ago, they cashed it. Now Jon’s account had been overdrawn, and he had overdraft fees adding up everyday that he didn’t pay the bank back. The utility office didn’t do what they said they would do. They didn’t shred the check.
Today, Jon was going to get revenge. He pulled into the nearest parking space in front of the utility office, and shut his truck down. He sat in his truck for a minute, thinking about what was about to go down. It seemed easy. He would walk in, wave his gun around, and tell them to give him the money. He didn’t want a bunch of money. He didn’t want to be rich. He just wanted the money to put back into the bank, so his account was back in the positive. He wanted $88.17.
When Jon finally decided to go ahead with his plan, he flipped the sun visor up. The sun had gone down behind the utility building, so the visor didn’t need to be down anymore. It was just in his way. When he flipped the visor back up, he noticed a little silver angel that was clipped to it. His mother had given it to him about a week before she died. She considered it a guardian angel. He stared at the angel for a couple of minutes. Again thinking about what he was about to do.
"I can’t do this," Jon thought to himself. "This is wrong. Jesus would never do this. God would never agree to this. This isn’t right. I can’t threaten someone with a gun. I can’t steal money."
The thoughts made Jon aggravated. He didn’t know what he wanted to do. He really felt like he needed to go in, and get the money. But he knew that that would be the wrong thing to do. It wouldn’t have made his problems go away. It would actually only make them worse.
"Thou shalt not steal. I should just try to make the most out of this situation." Jon thought. "I need to quit feeling sorry for myself, and get this straightened out. It’s not their fault that the check got lost, and they went ahead and cashed it."
After thinking that, Jon started his truck back up, and put it in reverse. He backed out of the spot, and headed back onto the street. He knew that it was wrong. He wasn’t going to go in, stealing money, because of a little mishap at the bank. Jon was going to go home, call the bank, and see what they could do. Stealing wouldn’t have done anything, but scared the lady at the utility office, and got him arrested, or maybe even killed.
From now on, Jon was going to try to live a better life. He was going to try to live his life, like Jesus lived his. He was going to try to stop drinking, cussing, and sinning. He was going to start going to church, and praying. He realized that God spoke to him when he was sitting in the truck. He realized, that if you shut up and listen every once in a while, you hear God, and God is always right. That day, Jon realized that living your life in a better way wasn’t that hard. It was actually quite easy. And when you start to live life better, you feel a whole lot better about yourself, and this world. Sure, you will get negatives, but with the positives, come the negatives. And if you can make a positive out of a negative, your life will be a lot more delightful.
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