My First Car
by Oliver Carlos
I had my first car when I was 23 years old. My car was also 23 years old. It’s a cute little sky blue Mitsubishi Minica. I love its size because it’s so easy to park and I can maneuver it to squeeze thru tight spaces. But the best thing I like about it is its fuel efficiency. Under the Minica’s hood is a 2-cylinder 550 cc engine. The motorcycles you see on SLEX have similar engines. So you can just imagine how much gasoline I consume in one month. My Minica is like a 4-wheeled motorcycle!
But most things aren’t too-good-to-be-true. My Minica also had some drawbacks. Being so old, it had gone thru tremendous wear and tear. So every 2 weeks I was in the talyer (car hospital). Some parts needed repair or replacement. For my safety, I couldn’t just let these car troubles remain unattended, so I really had to get them fixed.
In one of my talyer sessions, the mechanic said something that really stuck to my mind. It became like a life principle for me. It also had a great Biblical sense. The mechanic said:
“Alagaan mo maigi yan, dahil kung hindi, unti-unti ka niya na iiwanan”.
The rough English translation is: Take good care of your car, otherwise, one day it will leave you.
This principle is true not only to my Minica but also to any material possession. If you have a haphazard treatment of your gadgets, your house, your appliances, you will lose them before you know it.
This is also true for relationships. If you don’t cultivate your friendships, your marriage, your connection with your kids, their hearts will drift away from you, far to a point that may be beyond control.
We can see this truth in the Parable of the Talents (Matthew 25:14–30, NLV). People usually see just one side of this story, the obvious part: If you are a good steward of small things, God will entrust you with bigger things. Yes, that’s true.
But there is another truth in the parable that we shouldn’t overlook: If you are not a good steward of the thing entrusted to you, whether big or small, that will be taken away from you. We read it in verse 29:
“To those who use well what they are given, even more will be given, and they will have an abundance. But from those who do nothing, even what little they have will be taken away”.
Take note of the second sentence. If you do nothing about the little breach that you have in things and in relationships, expect the worse to happen. So you better do something. Take good care of what God has entrusted to you, especially people.
