Is New Really Better? Well, no, and, yes! A comparison of CFL's and Baptism

This might get a little long but, trust me, there is a point.  Skip to the end if you want to preview that point.

I get a newsletter from my electric company every once in a while telling me how wonderfully they supply power to my home and how worthy they are of my $188/mo.  Today's email featured CFL's and the fact that incandescent bulbs have been declared illegal within a couple of years and you can't even get 100 watt versions anymore. 

This really bummed me out.  I recently got a pretty good deal on some CFL bulbs and now I know why.  They are terrible.  I bought two types; 13 watt (replaces 60 watt standard bulbs) and replacements for the spot-lights in my kitchen and bath.  I think the worst part is that they don't work right away.  When I flick the switch there is now this 1/2 second delay between power to the bulb and its lighting up.  Mind you, a 1/2 second won't kill anyone.  But then when they finally fire up, they aren't really working either.  They cast such a dim light that you can actually look up at them and see the coiled inner bulb inside the reflector housing of the spotlight.  It takes 1 to 2 minutes for them to finally create enough heat or whatever is needed to get them to shine at their fullest potential luminosity.

And then there is disposal--nothing lasts forever, you know.  Did you know that these things have mercury in them and that you cannot, legally, dispose of them in the trash in many states?  And even if it is legal where you live, would you want to knowing the horrible things it does to the environment and your health?  (read more about it here and here).

But as I read further, there were more problems.  How many times have we been changing a bulb when it slips out of our fingers and breaks on the tile/wood floor?  Well, if this happens to you with a CFL bulb, you might as well call in a Haz-mat team and declare your home a Superfund Cleanup site.  Here is the nonchelant way in which they instruct you to do your own cleanup.  Note, they come from the EPA!!   That's right, the Environmental PROTECTION Agency.

It would seem that in our human quest to be better, cleaner, more efficient, whatever, that we are willing as a society to overlook some very sobering facts.  Facts that could be quite deadly if not taken seriously, yet, it would seem to me that they haven't been taken seriously.  After all, how many Americans are going to add a third bin in the Garage?  TRASH-check, RECYCLE-check, TOXIC WASTE-what?!?!?!  I know our trash service doesn't pick that up, so who is really going to dispose of those things properly.  I suspect we will all do what we always to.  Feign ignorance and just hide our dirty little secrets in the trash.

We do this spiritually as well.  We  say we're sorry, but do we really mean it.  We pretend that we didn't mean to cheat on our taxes or that we were only going "5 or 10 over" the speed limit as if its a fluid or relative guideline which slides depending upon  our personal wants or needs.  We do this will all of the Law.  We don't put God first, and we seldom love our neighbors as ourselves.

But God offers the greatest clean-up plan out there--its called grace.  What's that?  Its the free gift of forgiveness available to all people because of what Jesus did on the cross in our place.  He paid for our sin.  He is the haz-mat containment unit which mitigates our sin.  He allows us to enter God's presence and his kingdom without us stinking up the place, because the stench of sin has been removed from us.  Of particular help in understanding this is the beautiful act of Baptism whereby all sin that we inherited from our fore-bearers, all the way back to Adam and Eve, is literally washed away from us.  The one toxin which could keep us out of heaven, is mitigated forever.  No sticky tape, no wet paper towels, no evacuations of the house.  Just pure, unadulterated love and forgiveness.

That kind of mercy is not only refreshing, but powerful--trans-formative even.  Having been transformed, then, you now look for a way to live in that new state of Grace.  You ask questions like, "How can I show God how much I appreciate what he has done for me?" and, "who can I share this wonderful feeling with?" and, "who do I know who doesn't have this grace?  How can I share God's mercy with them?"

Each of us who has been baptized is this new creation--we have been born again.

Don't feel it?  Don't worry, that doesn't mean you aren't forgiven or that you are not a new being, but perhaps its just been awhile since you spent time considering it.  Each of us moves through life at such a fast pace, that perhaps we have feigned ignorance about just how far from the depths of hell we have been snatched.  Maybe we haven't truly prepared ourselves before confession and absolution?  Maybe we haven't really considered what it took to place the body and blood of Christ in that bread and wine?  But, maybe, the next time we replace that old light bulb with the new one, we will.  And when we put things in perspective, the grace and mercy we receive in Absolution and Holy Communion is just that much sweeter.

Peace today.
Perry