Mercy and the Meter Maid
John Fischer

I was sitting outdoors at my favorite coffee spot. It's the first morning in a long while that hasn't chilled me to the bone. Now I know you east coasters are laughing yourselves silly hearing me talking about chilling myself to the bone in February in Laguna Beach, but I've learned from living all over the country that being cold or warm is a relative thing. Depending on the situation and your state of preparedness, 50° in California can feel colder that 30° in Massachusetts.

The crowd is up a little, also reflecting the warmer weather. Suddenly a voice barks out to all of us outside, "Any of you belong to this white Chrysler here?" It's the Laguna Beach meter maid in her blue shorts and baby blue uniformed top. It's a known fact that this town makes a good deal of revenue off of its parking meters and subsequent tickets, and a town can come to depend on that. There is usually little mercy shown. I have seen people running up and begging her to let them off while she's in the middle of writing a ticket, but nothing doing. If the pencil's to the metal, it's all over. That's why we all looked on with a little bit of shock when she tried to find the owner of a car that was obviously in violation of the parking code.

The lady, who owns the dress shop next door, came out and, always positive, said that the driver of the car could have put money in the wrong meter. "That could be, said the meter maid, "but these are both empty."

Nonetheless that little stall delayed the ticket writing long enough for the owner of the car to come running out from inside. "I was getting change!" she cried, waving quarters over her head, and the meter maid stayed until she had pumped a few of them into the machine. And as the meter maid continued on up the street, the dress shop owner exclaimed, "Now there is someone who is going to heaven!"

Okay, so it's a little overstated. Showing mercy as a ticket taker isn't enough to get anyone into heaven, but I would go as far as to say that not showing mercy could keep someone out. (Forget ticket takers; we're talking about you and me now.) Not because anyone's earning heaven, but because it could be argued that someone who is not merciful has not received God's mercy, or probably better said - doesn't think they need it. You just can't receive a get-out-of-hell-free card when you know you deserve to go there, and then turn around and wish it on someone else. That amounts to thinking you deserve to go over them. I'm sorry, but no one who thinks they deserve it in the slightest way -- even a relative way (more than someone else) -- is going to be in heaven.

Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy. (Matthew 5:7)

PDL