Morning Devotional

July 16, 2003

“Car Horns”  

by Don Emmitte

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Always be full of joy in the Lord. I say it again--rejoice! Let everyone see that you are considerate in all you do. Remember, the Lord is coming soon. Don't worry about anything; instead, pray about everything. Tell God what you need, and thank him for all he has done. If you do this, you will experience God's peace, which is far more wonderful than the human mind can understand. His peace will guard your hearts and minds as you live in Christ Jesus. And now, dear brothers and sisters, let me say one more thing as I close this letter. Fix your thoughts on what is true and honorable and right. Think about things that are pure and lovely and admirable. Think about things that are excellent and worthy of praise. (Philippians 4:4-8 NLV). 

Do you remember when the whole lower half of a car's steering wheel used to constitute the car's horn? A car horn that was half the size of the steering wheel made it so much easier to find and hit than locating today's microscopic, camouflaged little buttons. How are you ever supposed to find and use your horn in the nanosecond you have in case of a pending accident? Recently when explaining the features on a truck that I sold, the client’s daughter made an interesting comment. She said something to the effect that a horn was mainly for communicating to another driver that you are angry with them. Nothing really shocks me from children anymore. However, this was a slight source of embarrassment to the client. 

It did start me thinking. When had a car horn become mostly an instrument to express road rage? I really don’t think of a car horn that way at all! So I started to tell her all about all the old fashioned uses of the trusty car horn. Isn't a horn primarily for accident prevention? To warn another driver that they are straying into your path, or in danger of hitting you? How else are horns used? Well, of course there is the friendly little "hello" honk. Then there is the romantic or flirting honk. Then there is the sentimental goodbye honk: one woman taps her horn lightly whenever she leaves her mother's home, a cute little ritual that somehow signals all is well between them. A goodbye honk is like a goodnight kiss: hard to do if you are mad at someone.

So what are we teaching our kids by example and what they absorb from the rest of society if they look at car horns primarily as a tool of aggression? The increase in road rage and the erosion of the old-fashioned car horn to the point where it is mainly an accent mark for flaring tempers is undoubtedly due to many factors. But can we stem this trend by taking a look again at how we see other people? When we respect other people as God's creation, as people that God also loves, we move even our road etiquette up a little higher on the civility scale. 

Our reading today emphasizes this truth. What are you communicating with your horn? In fact, what are you communicating with your speech toward others?