This is my first ever blog post on my ever first blog and I don't fully know what I am doing yet, so please bear with me and we will start this journey together.
Well, I guess I should start at the beginning, so here it goes. I have just begun a new Bible study through the YouVersion app called "Heartwork". The 'Heart' part concerning the scriptures being read and how it should affect a change of heart. Then the 'Work', this refers to daily acts that are suggested to help me become a better servant.
Anyway, I'm a couple days into this new plan and I get down to the 'Work' section and it asks me to do something nice for someone I don't know that I don't expect to be payed back for. Now, I don't remember what was going on this day, but I remember not seeing another human - including my roommate - for many hours.
Evening rolls around and my friend, Austin, and I go to his house to play some Halo (Master Chief Collection just came out!) when another friend, Phil, comes over and starts to play with us. After a while we all get hungry and decide that we should go eat before Phil has to leave for work.
We decide to go to Wendy's. On the way it dawns on me that I can pay for someone's meal at the drive-thru, sort of like that pay it forward thing that happened at Chik-fil-A a couple of years ago. Well, we end up going inside to eat and there isn't another soul in the whole restaurant. I am the last to order and I'm thinking about giving the lady at the window some money to pay for the next order when a couple, who appears to be their late 30's/early 40's, walks in. I place my order and the cashier asks if that will be all, I step to the side and say "and whatever they would like." The woman looks at me questioningly then the cashier asks "you're gonna pay for their meal?" I reply that yes, I am, and she smiles at me then she and her husband(?) step up and place their order.
When the order comes out they place it all on the same tray and the woman asks what all I had ordered. I ask for a separate tray and begin splitting our food. At this time, the man steps up and looks confused (he's holding money in his hand), I now realize that he must not have heard me. He asks about paying for their meal since it has been served and he's still holding the cash. The cashier explains that I paid for them while he hands us our drinks, and the wife nods in agreement to her husband then turns and thanks me.
This is where things get weird.
The man just starts yelling. "Oh, no. Give him his money back! Why did you pay for my food?"
The man just starts yelling. "Oh, no. Give him his money back! Why did you pay for my food?"
"I'm sorry, sir. I was just trying to bless someone tonight."
"I don't know you. You don't pay for my food. You bless somebody else." Then he turns to his wife and yells at her "You don't thank him. You don't know him either."
Now, this whole situation is super awkward for me (and for the cashier and for the couple that just walked in the door, heard the outburst, shook their heads, and walked out) and I'm trying to be really calm, but when he started yelling at his wife I got very upset. I kept my cool, don't worry. I just apologized to him again while he called the manager over. He wanted me to be refunded the cost of their food, but the manager, rightfully so, didn't understand the problem. She tells me to be seated and she'll give me my money later.
I finally get to the table where Austin and Phil are quite perplexed about what just happened. They're nearly done eating so they talk while I eat. Austin suggests that maybe it was just pride that caused the situation, like the man felt as if I thought he couldn't pay for his own meal, but I've been in those situations and even felt that way myself and this didn't feel like that at all. We finish and I go to the front and ask the cashier "Do you need me to do anything?"
"To wait right there.......while I give you your money back."
She shakes her head and talks about the nerve of some people, then opens the till and hands me $10. Their meal was only $9 and some change. I hand her the money back and tell her to use it - when she thinks it would be safe to do so - to pay for the next person who comes through the drive-thru or in the restaurant. She thanks me for what I did and how I handled the situation then she and the cashier inform me that, anytime I feel inclined to pay for their meals, they would not have any qualms about it whatsoever.
I get home and tell my roommate, Jeremy, about it and he says that he thinks it's just the devil trying to bother me. He thinks that satan is working to make me feel like it's more of a hassle to help people than it is worth.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Now remember how I said I got mad? I was mainly angry at the fact that this man yelled at his wife for no reason, but I was undoubtedly upset about the whole situation.
Then I started thinking. Really thinking.
How many times in our lives have we been given a blessing by God and just outright refused it? It can happen in so many different ways, probably a lot of ways that we don't even think about. The most obvious way, of course, is that we don't accept the free gift of eternal life given to us when Christ willingly died for our sins, but it could be as simple taking something for granted. We have, in America anyway, the freedom to worship pretty much anywhere and in any way we want, yet we skip church to watch television while people in other countries are being shot to death on the way to their underground churches. Or we throw away our leftover food when plenty of others go days without eating. Our privileges and excess have numbed us to the fact that the things we have are blessings. We have all these freedoms in America, we have so many advantages. When we take those blessing for granted we are refusing God's goodness. You see, I had no right to be upset with that man, because I reject God on a daily basis. And does God get angry with me? No. He continues to love me. He doesn't just love me in a "I'm your creator so I guess I have to love you" love; He loves aggressively, passionately, jealously, and without fail. He loves me in spite of my rejections. Because of them. Not only does he continue loving me, but He keeps piling on the blessings! More blessings than I can even recognize right now. Blessings that I won't realize are blessings until years down the road.
When I reject God, I am rejecting the biggest blessing of all, Jesus Christ. I have multiple opportunities throughout the day to say "Thank you" to my creator for so many things in my life: family, friends, central heat/air, education; but I don't. And He doesn't get angry with me. He doesn't yell at me. He doesn't tell me that I'm ungrateful. He just loves me more than ever. And that's exactly how we should approach rejection. When we try to do something good for others it isn't always going to go the way we plan it out in our heads. Instead of getting mad, we just have to keep on trying to bless others.
If we are going to call ourselves Christians then we have to practice the love we preach. Never stop giving. Never stop loving.
No comments:
Post a Comment