Everybody loves a good practical joke, as long as they are the one playing it. The brunt of the joke is generally more upset than he is entertained, especially when he was the victim of one of Shawn Davis’ practical jokes. Shawn is a three time world champion saddle bronc rider, the general manager of the National Finals Rodeo, and a boxing son of a gun. I think the boxing part was the only thing that kept him from getting his clock cleaned over some of the jokes he’s played over the years. One night, when I was working for Shawn, we hauled a bunch of his race horses from Filer down to Grace, Idaho to Dixon Hamilton’s place. It’s only about a three hour drive down there, but the lights went out in Shawn’s trailer, so we ended up pulling an all-nighter, having left Filer at around seven in the evening. As long as Shawn was awake, I had to be, as well. The good news was that he is quite a storyteller, and he told me about all kinds of practical jokes he had played on folks over the years, some of which I was witness to. He had had someone make him a plate of brownies with Ex-Lax in them and had them sent to the rodeo office at Tucson one year with a big card that said, “To Shawn Davis.” Several of the guys saw them and told Shawn out behind the chutes that they were waiting in the office for him. He told them, “You guys keep your hands off of them. I’ll be over there to get them, myself.” Of course, they did the opposite. They got them, ate them, and at least three or four bronc riders had accidents during the middle of their rides and had to walk gingerly back to the bucking chutes for a new pair of skivvies. Another time, he had his right hand man, Jon Taylor, robbed at the CNFR. Jon was in charge of the cash for the CSI rodeo team, and Shawn dressed a couple of big bulldoggers in ski masks to jump Jon. John Smith had conveniently “borrowed” Jon’s knife from him that afternoon, so he was defenseless as the boys robbed him. That one goes right back to everyone loving a practical joke, except the brunt of the joke. My favorite one of Shawn’s, however, was the time he threw a dead antelope in the trunk of Larry Mahan’s car during the heat of the summer. He knew Mahan kept his rigging bag in the back seat, so he collected the road kill and placed it in the trunk. The worst part, according to Shawn, was that it was during Mahan’s semi-hippy phase, and he wasn’t really showering regularly. Because it had been so hot, Larry simply thought he had been smelling himself, and it was several days before the sweet aroma emanating from the carcass became strong enough for him to search the car. That seems somewhat hard to believe, but the same thing happens to many of us with sin in our lives. We think it’s nothing, or it’s not going to cause any problems, and then we become used to the odor. Eventually, we just think it’s the way it is. We’re kind of like that frog in the boiling water. As long as the heat is turned up slowly, we accept it and think it’s bearable, or maybe even a good thing (just part of being a hippy, I guess). The fact is that it’s rotten. It’s appalling. It’s disgusting, and it’s riding around in the trunk of our car, and we try to say it’s nothing. We’re carrying it, for crying out loud! The sad thing is that we’ve all got an antelope in the trunk. Even the best of us! But there’s someone willing to remove it, clean the car—heck, get us a brand new car. But if we keep driving around with it in the trunk just thinking it’s part of the new phase, we never ask for the car to be cleaned. We just breathe through our mouth. 1 John 1: 7-9 says, “But if we are living in the light, as God is in the light, then we have fellowship with each other, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, cleanses us from all sin. If we claim we have no sin, we are only fooling ourselves and not living in the truth. But if we confess our sins to him, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all wickedness.” I’d like Jesus to clean the trunk and go get the guy who put it in there, and that’s exactly what he came to do. Let him in. He’ll get your ride looking and smelling like brand new.
Posted on: Thu, 13 Nov 2014 05:28:50 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015