HOW SHOULD WE RECORD LIFE'S HURTS?

HOW SHOULD WE RECORD LIFE’S HURTS?

Two African friends, Lesiba and Nomsa, were walking together at the edge of the Sahara Desert.  At some point in their journey, they had a terrible argument and Lesiba forcefully slapped her friend in the face.  Nomsa, who had just gotten slapped, was feeling quite hurt.  But without uttering a single word, she knelt and wrote in the sand, “Today my best friend, Lesiba, slapped me in the face.”

They kept on walking until they found a refreshing oasis; there they decided to take a bath.  Nomsa, who had been slapped, soon got stuck in quicksand and started sinking.  Naturally her friend, Lesiba, saved her life by pulling her out of the thick mire.  After Nomsa recovered from her near drowning experience, she wrote down on a stone, “Today my best friend, Lesiba, saved my life.”

Lesiba, who had both slapped and saved her best friend, Nomsa, asked a very important question: “After I hurt you, you wrote in the sand, and now you have written my good deed in stone.  Why?”

Nomsa replied with a knowing smile, “When someone hurts us, we should write it down in sand, where the winds of forgiveness can erase it, but when someone does something good for us, we must always engrave it in stone, so nothing can ever erase it.”

Today, we must learn to write our hurts in sand and to inscribe our blessings in stone.

Some people tend to record the faults and failures of others on what I call an EMOTIONAL ABACUS.*  That is, they make conscientious efforts to mentally record personal offenses, and this stored information influences their future associations and interactions with others.  However, the New Covenant constrains us to react to our hurts in a decidedly different way.  In the words of the Apostle Paul, TRUE LOVE “does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, IT KEEPS NO RECORD OF WRONGS.  Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth.  It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.” (I Corinthians 13:5-7, NIV)

My friend, here is a mission-critical point for you to ponder: How is your LOVE LIFE?  If the all-seeing GOD inspected your emotional abacus (and He does), would it be more reflective of offenses or blessings?

Sisters and brothers, be continually blessed, and please (above all else) MAKE SURE YOU ARE READY TO MEET OUR SOON COMING KING. Maranatha!

(*) An ABACUS is a counting device that consists of a frame holding rods on which a specific number of beads are free to move about and record numerical values.