It's understandable, due to "equine nature". I read that a horse produces 15 - 35 pounds (!) of manure a day. In London there were more than 11,000 hansom cabs on the streets; AND thousands of horse-drawn buses - each using 12 horses a day; AND a slew of smaller "vehicles", like delivery carts...all using horses...all of which contributed to what became known as the Great Horse Manure Crisis.
I assume the "nine feet" would be the result if the manure were never shoveled. There must have been crews trying to clean the stuff and leave the streets...if not clean, at least less gross! But I can't imagine how the people stood the stench of all those horse droppings. Did they just get used to it?
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After reading of this curious Crisis, I wondered if God, when He looks down on Earth and sees the streets of our lives "deep in the manure of sin"...with its attendant stink...wonders, "How can those people stand the stench of their sins? Do they just get used to it?"
Manure is a perfectly healthy (for the horse, at least) by-product of "equine nature". Sin is a perfectly unhealthy by-product of "human nature":
"But I was born a sinner, yes, from the moment my mother conceived me." (Psalm 51:5)
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Back in the Israelites' history, God at times got really fed-up with them:
"Woe to the sinful nation, a people whose guilt is great, a brood of evildoers, children given to corruption...." (Isaiah 1:4)
Later in Isaiah, talking about the ones who were defiant and arrogant in their sin, "These people gag me. I can't stand their stench." (65:5) Did the people just get used to the stink?
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The solution to the Great Horse Manure Crisis was the arrival of the motor car. There was now a way to avoid the stench and pervasiveness of the manure. And the solution to Man's Sin crisis was the arrival of the Son of God who payed the humanly-incomprehensible price for our forgiveness. There is now a way to avoid the stench and pervasiveness of Sin.
"He Himself bore our sins, in his body on the cross, so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness; by His wounds you have been healed." (I Peter 2:24)
(After motor cars arrived, one could still have used a horse if he wanted - but he would have to deal with all the manure. And though Jesus provided the way to be free from sin, we can still decide to disobey if we want - but we will have to deal with the consequences.)
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"But now that you have found you don't have to listen to sin tell you what to do, and have discovered the delight of listening to God telling you...a whole, healed, put-together life right now, with more and more of life on the way!..God's gift is real life, eternal life, delivered by Jesus, our Master." (Romans 6:22-23, The Message)
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Father, bless You!
You not only provided The Solution,
You also gave us the incredible gift of eternal life at your side.
Help me to always listen to You!
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