What has happened here?
I see two men assembling
a child’s red wagon
on the floor of an office building.
The wagon will be used
for advertising purposes.
The office is for insurance
purchases. You pay money now
to keep from paying more money
later, but you hope never to pay
any money. It’s a form of corruption
or tax. The law demands you buy insurance.
Yet I knew a girl who once pulled
a wagon full of cucumbers through
the same neighborhood, selling them
for a nickel, three for a dime and
said goodbye to her mother who
said to her, “Be careful and be
sure to be home for dinner.”
So the child pulled the wagon alone
through the neighborhood and sold
her cucumbers door to door.
She always came home to dinner
on time.
What has happened here?
The child is no longer safe to pull
a wagon through the neighborhood
or walk through the neighborhood
alone. It isn’t safe. No one would
encourage her to do so. The streets
were dirt. Now they are paved.
The houses were simple. Now they
are fully equipped, but the spirit
of innocence is gone. The Holy
Spirit and the red wagons are
gone and there is no insurance
for what has happened to the red wagons
or the children or the innocence
unless perhaps you believe in
the mercy of God, unless perhaps
the policy has expired, we haven’t
kept up the premiums and next comes
the unmitigated wrath for which there
is no insurance.
♠