August 5, 2013 (Monday)
Years ago our car was stolen in a big Texas city. It was full of stuff, including a box of cassette tapes, among which were recordings of the operetta, “The Mikado.” The police told us the thieves were juvenile gang members from a neighboring community. They abandoned the car after wrecking it. No attempt was made to locate the budding bandits.
No doubt the young crooks thought they were stealing rock music by some group known as “Mikado.” I would love to have seen their faces when they played the tapes. Gilbert and Sullivan never resembled Jagger and Richards.
Made me think of another group of thieves during my college days. Some guys from another college stole our mascot, which happened to be a young bear. They kept him calm with coca cola but after a while he wanted out of the car. Suddenly the car was seen quickly pulling over to the highway shoulder, all four doors opening and college boys running from it in every direction, followed by a bear that only wanted another coke. Seems the bear was bearing his claws.
Too bad there isn’t some way to disappoint a youthful thief the first time he tries to steal something. Remember Pavloff’s dog? Electric shocks were administered to teach the dog to avoid bad behavior. Problem is, however, that the earliest thefts are usually so small that kids get away with stealing stuff. As time goes by, the thefts grow larger and the day finally comes that it amounts to a felony.
I remember being in a supermarket one day and some of my friends broke open a sack of potato chips and ate some of them. They swore they found it already open. No matter. They were hauled in to the office, police were called, and even though they were under ten years of age, learned that day never to do such a thing again. Don’t you wish that could happen more often?
Really bad behavior usually starts out as cute stuff that does not seem to matter. Jesus taught us to nip bad thoughts in the bud. Remember the camel’s nose in the tent. “Not so bad” is still “bad.” Nip it. This applies to all the commandments, not just the “Don’t steal” one.