NASA is about to land a rover on Mars, and the engineers are anxious. They are departing from their recent success with air-bag landers, and trying to navigate with parachutes and rocket thrusters. There is a lot that can go wrong during the entry and soft landing. They've only been successful at landing on mars 55% of the time. That is great in baseball, but not so reassuring when millions of dollars and lots of science is at stake. The critical point in the 8 month journey is the landing - the contact with the atmosphere - the slowing down process. It takes roughly seven minutes to go from 13000 miles per hour to a complete stop, and everything has to go just right. For the engineers with careers on the line, it's seven minutes of terror, CNN says.
Seven minutes of terror. It was a good headline - it grabbed my attention. Fox might want to think about using that label for their international news spot. It could boost ratings. If I think back on my life, seven minutes of terror could aptly describe my experience as a 10 year old on Space Mountain in Disneyworld.
Or the time when my wife and I, when we were newlyweds, went on a canoe trip on a river in North Georgia. We had read in a guidebook that miners had drilled a shaft through a horshoe bend in the river. It was a few hundred yards from the entrance to the exit, at the elevation of the riverbank, and water flowed through the shortcut. "IF you can see daylight coming from the other side, odds are there are no dangerous obstructions." When we arrived, we anxiously debated whether to try it or not - how brave were we feeling? Was it worth the risk? Ah, to be young again. We pointed our canoes into the cave, and paddled forward.
It was like a real-live mine ride, minus the corporate liability prevention measures. We were instantly surrounded by blackness. The water picked up speed to a swift rapid pace, and so did our canoes. Several mid-shaft dropoffs added to the terror. Our paddles banged against the close, cold, wet rock. Our screams were not of the manufactured variety that you hear on a roller coaster to add to the fun; we were terrified, and the ride would not stop.
Our canoes tipped just before the current jetisoned us out the other side. We emerged bruised but otherwise unharmed, imagining all of the ways that the descent could have gone wrong. Seven minutes of terror.
I wonder what it was like for Abraham, when God asked him to sacrifice his son? Anxiety building, resolve wavering, exit considered, faith overcoming, all quietly kept in Abraham's heart. With each curious question of his son, the tears must have welled in Abraham's eyes, sucking the moisture from his already dry mouth and throat. And then, the moment when Isaac's curiousity unveiled the truth. There was no other sacrifice to offer. Dad is going to kill me as he serves our God. Seven minutes of terror, before the ram was produced and the story had a happy ending, all the while leaving the participants and the reader with a disturbing and innocence-killing aftertaste.
Oh, that we could promise the world only seven more minutes of terror. Oh, that the Janjaweed militias would have only seven minutes of numb destruction remaining. Oh, that the Lord's resistance army would have only seven minutes of child-soldier training left in their strategic plan of chaos. Oh, that there was only time for one more house-to-house search in Iraq. Oh, that a drunken father would come home angry for the last time, and after seven minutes of reckless searching, would pass out and later awaken to peace, repentance, and eternal sobriety.
Come quickly and provide us a ram, Oh God. Sacrifice our innocence if you must, but spare our children from another seven minutes of terror.
Seven minutes of terror. It was a good headline - it grabbed my attention. Fox might want to think about using that label for their international news spot. It could boost ratings. If I think back on my life, seven minutes of terror could aptly describe my experience as a 10 year old on Space Mountain in Disneyworld.
Or the time when my wife and I, when we were newlyweds, went on a canoe trip on a river in North Georgia. We had read in a guidebook that miners had drilled a shaft through a horshoe bend in the river. It was a few hundred yards from the entrance to the exit, at the elevation of the riverbank, and water flowed through the shortcut. "IF you can see daylight coming from the other side, odds are there are no dangerous obstructions." When we arrived, we anxiously debated whether to try it or not - how brave were we feeling? Was it worth the risk? Ah, to be young again. We pointed our canoes into the cave, and paddled forward.
It was like a real-live mine ride, minus the corporate liability prevention measures. We were instantly surrounded by blackness. The water picked up speed to a swift rapid pace, and so did our canoes. Several mid-shaft dropoffs added to the terror. Our paddles banged against the close, cold, wet rock. Our screams were not of the manufactured variety that you hear on a roller coaster to add to the fun; we were terrified, and the ride would not stop.
Our canoes tipped just before the current jetisoned us out the other side. We emerged bruised but otherwise unharmed, imagining all of the ways that the descent could have gone wrong. Seven minutes of terror.
I wonder what it was like for Abraham, when God asked him to sacrifice his son? Anxiety building, resolve wavering, exit considered, faith overcoming, all quietly kept in Abraham's heart. With each curious question of his son, the tears must have welled in Abraham's eyes, sucking the moisture from his already dry mouth and throat. And then, the moment when Isaac's curiousity unveiled the truth. There was no other sacrifice to offer. Dad is going to kill me as he serves our God. Seven minutes of terror, before the ram was produced and the story had a happy ending, all the while leaving the participants and the reader with a disturbing and innocence-killing aftertaste.
Oh, that we could promise the world only seven more minutes of terror. Oh, that the Janjaweed militias would have only seven minutes of numb destruction remaining. Oh, that the Lord's resistance army would have only seven minutes of child-soldier training left in their strategic plan of chaos. Oh, that there was only time for one more house-to-house search in Iraq. Oh, that a drunken father would come home angry for the last time, and after seven minutes of reckless searching, would pass out and later awaken to peace, repentance, and eternal sobriety.
Come quickly and provide us a ram, Oh God. Sacrifice our innocence if you must, but spare our children from another seven minutes of terror.
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