why wait for trouble. . .

Air Force General Chuck Yaeger was the star of TV commercials for an auto parts store some years back. After extolling the virtues of replacing old auto parts, he looked the camera squarely in the eye and asked, "Why wait for trouble to come to you?"

I can tell you why some of us do it. Laziness. Inertia. Procrastination. "I'll get it checked out on Friday," you say, and a month of Fridays goes by.

See this tire? I've been driving on it, in this condition, for at least two months. It made a rumbling sound that was noticeably worse driving back from Jacksonville in February.

I drive the Interstate twice a day, five days a week. The noise got worse. I finally dropped by my garage earlier this week. "You will be shocked when you see it," the man said. I was shocked. The missing tread was on the "inside," hard to see if you don't have the right angle, impossible to see if you don't get down and look. There isn't much below that exposed belt except a thin layer of rubber and a whole lot of compressed air.

As the man said, it could have blown sitting still.

There's no doubt in my mind that God watches over me behind the wheel, and this is just one more example.

Moral of the story: If it sounds wrong, feels wrong, or smells wrong, it's wrong. Get it fixed. Do it now.