We are once again approaching the Holiday Season often also known as the Season of Overpromising. Manufacturers box up stuff they happen to have lying around, put some qualifiers on the box, and then add a promise to lure you into buying.
Case in point is Mondo Llama’s color-your-own train kit shown above. This box is about three feet long by two feet tall by a foot deep. You have to also buy some Mondo Llama Markers which are sold separately.
The real puzzle to me is the promise or claim that this is “life size”. The last I checked train engines or really any train car are much larger than even the tallest person I know and considerable longer. Yet I’m promised this relatively small box has enough stuff in it to create a life size train engine. Maybe that’s why there’s no room for any Mondo Llama Markers. Also maybe why the clarifying “Makes 1” is also included.
Yes, I understand no one over the age of about, oh, ten, would actually believe this particular promise. And isn’t that the problem? We are encouraged to doubt and be skeptical, and yet buy anyway. No matter how outlandish the promise, we are to look past the words.
Does this skepticism affect us when we then read God’s promises in His word? Especially as Christians do we buy without believing? If we do, we miss out on so much. The first chapter of the Book of James cautions us about divided loyalty, about asking but not really believing we will receive.
This is the season to examine what we really believe about Jesus and His birth, His death and resurrection, and about God’s love for us.
Just Sayin' 