Quicksand

For my whole life I have successfully avoided quicksand. What happened to all the quicksand? I have never even seen a quicksand pit. My mind went down this profound rabbit hole while studying for last week’s sermon based on Psalms 9 and 10. In those psalms, David writes of falling into a pit set for the prey. I grew up in a time where quicksand was everywhere, according to movies and tv shows. There was quicksand in the jungles, on tropical islands, in the desert, in the deep woods and in the old West. I think even Lassie had to rescue Timmy from the quicksand once. Someone should have kept a better eye on Timmy. The plot was always the bad guys would stumble upon some quicksand and use it to catch the good guys, or for a damsel to become distressed. Someone always showed up to pull them out of the sinking sand. The damsel was always rescued, and the bad guys were trapped in the quicksand until they were arrested or drowned. 

While I’ve never seen quicksand, I have seen sinkholes. Sinkholes and quicksand sort of work on the same principle—agitated water undermines the ground soil. I have also learned that quicksand, sinkholes, and pits are metaphors for the traps we get ourselves into. Take social media, like Facebook and Instagram, for instance. We join in the fun of seeing family and friends, but we can quickly find ourselves sucked into the sinking sands of reposting sort of funny stuff. If we are not careful, we may find our selves “doom scrolling” through some dark alleyways, ridiculing embarrassed people caught (or set up) for shame, or just plain gossiping about people, whether they are famous, family, or friends of friends. Many of those pithy, satirical political posts, and artful humble brags are really designed to undermine other people’s self-esteem and tangle them up in faulty logic and false equivalencies. 

Any time anyone posts something that begins, “I don’t know if this is true or not, but if it is…” is gossiping. Clever gossip is still bearing a false witness. Paul reminds us that we are to be careful (even on social media), for we are witnesses to God’s truth. Read Ephesians 4:25-32. The old hymn reminds us every time we hear it, “From sinking sands He lifted me. With tender hand He lifted me.” 

Keep healthy. Pray mightily. Enjoy your life today. Be careful around quicksand. And let’s experience the love and power of God together while we are apart. 

. Bro. Darryl 

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