Thoughts from Mark "Hat" Rackley

Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God—this is your true and proper worship.  Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.  Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.

• Romans 12:1-2

As I stood in a museum dedicated to a famous soft drink, I thought of these verses.  The second of the barkers who introduced us to the World of Coca-Cola, told the history of how the elixir was designed for medicinal purposes, almost as a joke, as we realize that Coke has so many things that are not that good about it.  The world of advertising hype says to drink more, but…

It was great going down memory lane.  In that second room, I picked out the oldest item in the display case, but my wife mentioned it to the barker.  He said that she won a new car.  It looked just like her old one, and it’s parked in the garage right where you left it.  It was great drinking the company products from various places in the world.  The only one that I had drunk before was Beverly from Italy, and as the sign said, I drank it as a before dinner non-alcoholic aperitif.

But what struck me was that I was in a giant building devoted to a sodie water, okay soda water, soft drink, for you northerners, pop, but I avoid that word like the plague.  Then, I wondered why was I at this place, in that I had not partaken of caramel-colored drink in 30 years or more.  I had not had but two caffeinated drinks in over 20 years.

And why so much fuss over a soft drink?

Hmmmm.  Why so much fuss over anything man-made?

I thought of the statues in Charlottesville, VA that I have taken pictures of.  Those statues are being torn down for they represent a part of our history that others want to erase.  For one thing, why erase history?  It only results in falsehood.  For another, what of that history can we take with us when we go to Heaven?

I enjoyed the taste testing.  Some of the drinks were rather good.  Some were okay.  One tasted oddly like bath water, sweet but maybe the flavor matched a common soap aroma. It’s name was “Joy” as in a dish washing liquid. Hmmm.

I laughed at the protection, translated paranoia, of the secret formula.

But while we, while trapped in this world and destined for the next world, trudge our way through, making our own history, we should never forget the history of the past.  We should learn from our mistakes and those made by others, but can we achieve a heavenly perspective?  But this “museum” was advertisement hype that transcended history.  There were no “mistakes” here to learn from.

Can we see the glitz for what it is?

That being said, I may have one of my grandchildren model my new Coca-Cola cold weather hat, red with fake fur trim.  Hey, I may have wasted an afternoon, but when you come away with a new hat, it is not totally wasted.  And I will confess my sin in the due course of time…

I do not even think that our churches are truly a museum about how wonderful Jesus is.  Do we have all our priorities in the wrong place?

Soli Deo Gloria.  Only to God be the Glory.