BUS BULLY (Psalm 1:6)

6 For the LORD watches over the way of the righteous, but the way of the wicked will perish.

(NIV)

Riding the school bus is one of those few childhood memories that contains a scene I like to replay in my mind. Only the “big kids” were allowed to sit in the back seats of the bus. It was a time-honored tradition that was enforced with iron-clad fervor like only the rules of childhood can be. As the bus neared the end of its route and seats emptied, older students relocated to the rear of the bus, claiming the coveted seats. They sat tall with one leg stretched out on the seat and their arm resting across the back, an emperor of their own little islands of green Naugahyde and paint-chipped steel tubing. Because our house was on the end of the route, there were always more empty rear seats than there were riders. So one day I decided that even though I wasn’t one of the “big kids” there was no reason I couldn’t shift to the back. My move didn’t go unchallenged, however and I soon found myself on the receiving end of a tongue-lashing from an overzealous sixth-grader. Out of nowhere, my older brother appeared, bloodied the sixth-grader’s nose and made it clear to everyone on the bus that his little brother “could sit anywhere he wanted.” Up to that point, my brothers had always pretended I didn’t exist at school and I had grown accustomed to my invisibility. I was a little brother, an embarrassment when they were around their friends. It wasn’t something we talked about. It was just understood. I never realized until that day that they were watching out for me. Again and again, through middle school and high school there were subtle reminders of their protection and, yes, even love. The psalmist ends Psalm 1 with the reminder that God is watching out for us. Not out of some legalistic obligation, but because he knows us and loves us. Even when we aren’t aware of it, even when we’ve gotten use to thinking of ourselves as invisible, God is there. And he’s ready to come in swinging and tell the whole world that his child can sit anywhere we want.