you might be right

     A friend was happily planting her garden a few months ago when a complete stranger walked up and said, “Too late for that.” It made her angry (partly because she was afraid that it actually was too late to be planting). She sat there fuming. She felt like arguing with him, but instead she decided to say four healing words: “You might be right.” The man walked on down the street, and she went on happily planting her garden.

     She uses those four healing words a lot, and she says they work every time.

“A gentle response defuses anger, but a sharp tongue kindles a temper-fire.” Proverbs 15:1

interruptions

     I’ve spent a lot of my life trying to be productive and efficient, which means that I’ve spent a lot of my life avoiding interruptions (even when they’re people). I guess I thought that the ends somehow justify the means: if I’m doing something important, it’s okay to treat people like interruptions instead of treating them like . . . people.

     I don’t want to live that way anymore. That’s partly because, when I was too sick last month to be productive and efficient, I had to rely on other people. They didn’t treat me like an interruption. They treated me like an opportunity, and it felt very good.

“[Interruptions] are obstacles that get in the way of our being highly productive and efficient. And yet . . . they also present us with opportunities--opportunities to give our attention to others . . . , to concern ourselves with their troubles, to identify with their pain, to recognize and honor them by taking time to listen, to be for them a channel of God’s compassion and peace.” Br. David Vryhof

“Be compassionate just as your Father is compassionate.” Luke 6:36

heaven on earth

     Sometimes I’m afraid that I won’t have enough (health or strength or courage or whatever). When that happens, I have a choice. I can focus on the fear, which fertilizes it and makes it grow and multiply, or I can bring the fear to God, as if He were my good shepherd who would never withhold anything that is good for me. I’ve tried both in the past few weeks. One is heaven on earth.

“The Lord is my shepherd. I lack nothing.” Psalm 23:1

“The Lord withholds no good thing from those who walk with integrity.” Psalm 84:11

“Nothing can be necessary that He withholds.” John Newton

a bad habit

     Here’s the truth: what I say and do reflects who I am; what somebody else says and does reflects who he is—not who I am.

     Here’s the problem: I have a bad habit of taking somebody else’s snarky mood or look or comment personally. Instead of thinking, “Hmm, he must be having a rough day,” I think, “Yep, just as I suspected. I’m not ____ enough, and he knows it, too.”

     Here’s the solution: little by little, I can practice letting go of my bad habit and letting God change the way I think.

“Let God transform [me] . . . by changing the way [I] think.” Romans 12:2 

kneeling at our feet

     Sometimes I get a fleeting glimpse of God as He really is, and then I want to kneel, too.   

“In vain we search the heavens high above, / The God of love is kneeling at our feet.” Malcolm Guite

“Then He poured water into a basin and began to wash the feet of the disciples. . . .” John 13:5

detours, messes, defeats

     Yesterday, an old friend dropped in out of the blue. I hadn’t seen her in ages, and I was shocked. I had my usual too-long list of places to go and things to do, and her visit wasn’t on my list. We talked and we laughed and we reminisced. Later, when I looked backward from day’s-end and asked myself the question I try always to ask myself (“What was the most life-giving part of my day?”), the answer was clear: the visit. I wonder how often the most life-giving part of my day comes disguised as an out-of-the-blue detour—or even as a mess or a defeat?  

“[W]e need . . . a conviction in our bones that [God’s] purposes and his presence often come disguised as detours, messes, defeats.” Mark Buchanan

“At that moment, open-eyed, wide-eyed, they recognized Him.” Luke 24:31