God gave me the opportunity to practice, “blessed are you who are insulted on behalf of me” this week. Each week, Pastor Will drops the prayer requests from the prayer box on Hogan Road in my mailbox. Most weeks there are two kinds of cards – ones asking for healing from cancer or addiction for a family member and cards written by children praying for their friends and family (those are my favorite).
This week there was a card saying, “You people are a joke. No follow up.” When I received it, my first response was to chuckle and say something sarcastic that was not helpful at all. I realize that was probably a defensive response, pretending that this card did not bother me at all. Truth be told it does not bother me, to the extent that I believe in what we are doing here; but, I wanted to observe my thoughts on this card, and the person who wrote it, to see what God may be up to in my soul.
As I said, the first thought I had was sarcastic and unhelpful. My second thought was that I like jokes and jokes usually make me happy and joyful. So, I am okay with being a joke! Again, probably not helpful. Then I got to thinking, what would cause a person to walk by a church, see a prayer box, and write that about people he/she does not know? From there, another word of Jesus came to mind, “Love your enemies as yourself and pray those who persecute you” (Matthew 5:44).
The most generous assumption that I could come up with as to why this individual wrote this is that someone who is a Christian (or maybe a group of Christians) hurt this person. Or perhaps he/she was presented with a god that is not really the God revealed in Jesus Christ. He or she has allowed that hurt to fester, thus seeing all Christians through the lens of that hurt.
Now, God has softened my heart towards the person who thinks I am a joke. He has now become a person to love and a person to give to the Lord in prayer. Perhaps one day I’ll get to talk with him/her about it, but until then I commit to praying for this individual. Will you pray for them too?
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