Heritage For Sale
Marmon Motor Car Company has been dead for 90 years now, but their products were hot stuff back in the day. Their first vehicles began puttering around on public roads in 1902, and in 1911 they entered the very first Indy 500 race. They won. The purse was $14,000 – a ridiculous sum of money back then, ridiculous enough to insert Indianapolis-based Marmon Motor Car Company into headlines and kitchen-table conversations. Racing isn’t quite like it is today, where fragile impractical, multi-million dollar single-seaters do generally irresponsible things on mirror-smooth racetracks halfway around the world. Surviving a race in those early, experimental rigs was victory enough, and a win was like a gilded feather in the cap.
Marmon’s racing heritage conferred a reputation onto it that lasted throughout the remainder of its short history. Racing heritage sells cars. A 1931 Marmon Sixteen owner believed that the same durability, ruggedness, and performance that won Indy 20 years earlier were engineered into every leaf spring and pushrod of their vehicle.
Humans have heritage too. Following a long line of descendants who may have enjoyed big victories or may have made utter wrecks of their lives, a person is born with a heritage they can’t change.
But God changes all of that:
“For you have heard my vows, O God; you have given me the heritage of those who fear your name.” (Psalm 61:5)
Through God’s grace, the gift of a fine heritage – the rewards, blessings, and historic victories – is given. Suddenly, things like lineage and pedigree don’t matter. God rewrites the rules on heritage when he grants something so dear and valuable to entire masses of people. In fact, the Bible says God “has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in the kingdom of light” (Colossians 1:12).
You have a new family tree, a new family history, and a new family. You’re part of a genealogy that began long before you and includes every believer who lives or has ever lived. All believers are victors, all have tasted the despair of defeat, and all are ready for a final victory that can only come from God. The same God whose power parted the Red Sea is empowering you today, and giving power (and peace, love, and mercy) to every person you interact with today. Even if you, personally, haven’t had the kind of victory you want, victory is in your blood. It’s the heritage that was given to you.
The V16 powering the 1931 Marmon Sixteen was powered by a 491 cubic-inch (8.0-liter) pushrod unit generating 200 horsepower at a 6.0:1 static compression ratio. Most weighed north of 5,000 pounds. Fewer than 400 of these $5,000 chrome-encrusted behemoths were built, and today most are worth a cool million. The heritage of racing victory remains alluring, even nine decades later.
John V16 is the intersection of God and cars. Please support our work and donate a V16-powered 1940 Cadillac Series 90 Sixteen to John V16. Or share this article with a friend.
