TOILET PAPER
It’s a crazy world. That’s not new news… We just haven’t been reminded of how crazy until the next crisis comes around. I rarely write about personal or controversial things, but today, I’m gonna make an exception. Today we tackle toilet paper…
People are actually getting in physical altercations at stores over grocery carts and toilet paper. The world has gone mad. Anxiety and fear over the pending pandemic have a strangle hold on them.
I was out of town this week and came home to an Old Mother Hubbard kind of cupboard and frig, even the mustard bottle was on reserve.
The grocery store parking lot was jammed. It had more cars in it than I’d ever seen before. I had to park by the McDonald’s.
As a young man I was a little embarrassed to buy toilet paper. I’d have been proud to have some in my basket the other day, but there’s not a stitch of it at the store. The shelves look like something from the depression.
It’s peculiar how you can see fear in people’s eyes. Tough times are like truth serum; it exposes people for who they really are. The manners, for the most part, were gone. It was every person for themselves.
I know I might say it too much, but I have to remind myself that God either causes or allows all things. To fear a situation more than we do the One who caused or allowed it is to bring dishonor to Him. The Coronavirus is sitting right next to us… in the palm of His hand…
My dad was born into a cotton picking sharecropper’s family. He was smack in the middle of nine kids. I suppose the first time he ever saw indoor plumbing was at school.
Old habits die hard. I recall as a little kid my dad rubbing folded toilet paper together. It looked like someone trying to warm their hands up, only with the paper in-between his hands.
I learned that when he was a kid they didn’t have, nor could they afford, toilet paper. They had the Sears and Roebuck catalog sitting in the outhouse… They made their own toilet paper.
There were a few times as a kid we’d run out of toilet paper. And I learned first hand, or hands, that you can turn a piece of notebook paper into a soft piece of toilet paper… it just takes time.
I suppose if the world doesn’t come to its senses we can all use the stacks and stacks of junk mail that gets delivered to our homes every day and turn it into toilet paper.
We all have some anxiety and fear, some more than others, but I refuse to give into the enemy and let running out of toilet paper occupy a second of my life.
When it’s our time to go, God doesn’t need a virus to fulfill His will. And as Paul pointed out, it’s better to be absent from this body and to be present with The Lord.
Where we’re going we won’t need any toilet paper…
Sunday, March 15, 2020 @ 11:35 am
Floyd!!!!
Thank you!!!
No other words needed!!!!
Sunday, March 15, 2020 @ 1:08 pm
I understand about food items.. Couldn’t even pick up a chicken breast in the meat department today.
But toilet paper?
Give it a couple of days and the people who have hoarded the tp will be sorry.
Can’t wait for heaven!
Sunday, March 15, 2020 @ 2:24 pm
it is like that here also Floyd. Unbelievable. The church met today and i told them we have two choices: Fear or Faith. I choose fear over faith; praise over panic. One of the people in the church this morning told me they heard a pastor of a large church close by (that closed because they average about 2000) that he put an acrostic to FEAR. Fear Everything And Run or Face Everything And Rise. I prefer the latter. I refuse to give into panic and despair. As for tp? WOW! Why?
Monday, March 16, 2020 @ 3:27 am
Awesome post, Floyd. I’ll be grocery shopping today for the first time since the TP rush. I dread it in a way. Some of our stores, I’ve heard, are “wiped” clean, but the store I frequent had the good sense to only allow two units of paper goods to each customer. My parents grew up as your Father, kids of sharecroppers. I remember the Sears and Roebuck in my granny’s outhouse. So, I’ve already been putting aside the junk mail, just in case. I suppose at my age, I should be afraid, but I’m not really. I will use common sense, and trust Father to take care of the rest.
Monday, March 16, 2020 @ 5:25 am
I find it sad that the hope of many is in “toilet paper” rather than hope in the one one that sustains, provides, and gives hope. My personal challenge is not to become careless with the words I share both in public and in private. There are many that don’t know Christ. They lack the hope of future, they live day to day and in this day, perhaps toilet paper is their only hope as sad is that may be.
There are some that will take advantage, will hoard the toilet paper, will try to sell it on eBay or Amazon or other venues for crazy marked up prices.
Then I realize…. am I hoarding something even more valuable? Am I hoarding the love of Christ?
Monday, March 23, 2020 @ 11:47 am
I liked your reminded God does not need a virus to fulfil His will, His timing to take us home. When I had my heart surgery the doctors on my case kept telling me how lucky I was to still be alive. I said, when my house gets ready in heaven that’s when God will call me home.
Ryan hit the spot for me in the end of his comment, are we hoarding the love of Christ? Sweet conviction. God has send people to us during this time of being sequestered and our message box has been full of folks checking on us. The government may have issued the order to stay away from people but God over rides the government sometimes. Hint…I wrote about it on my blog which now is in WordPress.
Tuesday, March 24, 2020 @ 11:40 am
Well, I do have a lot of book pages in my house if times get desperate, but I hope I won’t have to use them in quite that way. 🙂