Oooops!

June 2, 2006

By Gary Rogers

We all make mistakes, and we all pay a price for making them. Even little mistakes can have sizeable consequences.

The Mariner I space probe was launched in July 1962. The probe was intended to study the planet Venus. But only minutes after launch, the mission was scrubbed and the probe sent into the Atlantic. It had to be destroyed when its Atlas rocket started to veer off course.

The mistake? A single character in the computer code. As a result of the delay and the necessity of a second rocket being launched, $18 million was wasted. That one mistyped character cost $18 million.

But even a catastrophe like that takes on a different perspective when placed alongside eternity. It is important for us to see things from an eternal perspective. I’m sure whoever was responsible for the loss of Mariner I felt like dirt. But what he needed was for someone to tell him to see his mistake in light of eternity.

When we get to heaven, Venus won’t matter. I feel pretty confident that there will be no computers in heaven either. (I hear that amen!)

“For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, is working for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory, while we do not look at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen. For the things which are seen are temporary, but the things which are not seen are eternal” (1 Corinthians 4:17,18, NKJV).

Gary Rogers is senior pastor of First Assembly of God in Coweta, Okla.