I enjoyed watching Muse on the Grammy’s this week. I like that style of music. It took me back to my college days when a band from Dublin named U2 took the world by storm. And overran my life, giving me music that resonated in tune with my life and faith in Christ. I remember playing the cassette of U2 “Under a Blood Red Sky” over and over until I had to buy a new one. The album was from a concert live at Red Rocks. The remastered DVD is a must-have purchase, the original concert cited by Rolling Stones as one of the top 50 moments that changed rock music.
This week, for my morning readings, Psalm 40 has been the Psalm for the week in my devotional book, A Guide to Prayer (I highly recommend this book to those who are looking for something to aid their spiritual life!). And, it’s funny because I think the first three verses are what God intends for me to learn this year. And waiting patiently has not been a part of my DNA.
This week I’ve been reflecting on grace a bit and how little of it there is between people, even in Christian circles where grace is an overarching theological theme. Yesterday I tried to be graceful to a semi-truck driver as he made the turn onto a bridge and couldn’t quite swing it. Since I once drove truck for a summer, I could instantly relate and I didn’t advance in my left turn lane (coming toward him) as the light turned red. He could then make the swing-out and not block 3 lanes of traffic indefinitely. He appreciated it. Lovely.
Except the guy behind me thought differently. As soon as I did this, he started yelling out his window. The whole delay cost him about 7 seconds, but as he drove past me (and we still made the light), he proceeded to say some ugly ugly things to me. For being graceful.
Do you enjoy house tours? We don’t do much of them, but occasionally we’ll go on one as part of a social function. Perhaps a host shows off the rest of the house, a neighbor is remodeling and wants to show you what they’re doing, or someone just bought a home and you were invited to look through it.
Sometimes Kel or I will be on a tour where there’s a group of people. And often a strange phenomenon happens: The house tour becomes a competition. Between the one showing off the home and the ones on the tour. The caveat is that the host never knows. She or he will never hear comments like “I would never do something like that in my home” or “where did they get the money to do that?” as their guests walk through their home. And often the comments are more pointed, more judgmental, more competitive – a dark contrast to the graciousness of the host.
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