I was dealt a considerable blow today.
Have you ever had something happen to you that was really hard to wrap your mind around? As if each time the fog lifted on the matter, you could only catch a glimpse at something. Upon each attempt your mind filed a snapshot of what you thought the problem to be, yet it was an all new image.
I grappled for the longest time with what I experienced. I deliberated long and hard as to whether to provide more specific examples of the cut to my belly. When dealing with specific issues, it can help to extrapolate them. I could do that. Not only won’t I, but that would be too easy for us all. Ease aside, the other thing it would do is color this blog entry in my paltry terms, and I’d rather you apply it in yours.
Imagine you have a person you rely on, a person of authority if you will, and you look up to them. Say for instance you’ve known this person to be moral and ethical in all the time that you know. Maybe you were raised as children and share a bond of growth. What if a traumatic experience like the mortality of a loved one, or a terrible event brought you alongside one another in faith? Is a greater bond available between people when empathy is the catalyst for your relationship? Import Christ.
Now, take the sum of your relationship and add a bald faced lie to the equation. Having found yourself the victim of this deception, would you still be able to face your friend in favorable light? I put to you the idea that this kind of treachery and the loathsome weight of a deceit such as this, is the epitome of extermination in terms of trust. That confidence was the foundation for your kinship. With a lie, and in this case the lie did in fact serve, your trust is now void. …Shattered, if you will, into the same number of sands as the whole of the Sahara.
The cut of a lie is the most unkind of all.
And what of you and I? Do we forgive? May we excuse this?
I shall not be counted among those like the parable of the unforgiving servant… Matthew 18:21-35. Rather those in the letter from Paul to the Ephesians, 4:32 specifically.
Ephesians 4:32 – Be kind to one another, tender-hearted, forgiving each other, just as God in Christ also has forgiven you.
This part of my walk is especially hard… I’m hoping and praying I can be salt and seek light.
Part 2 of this blog will publish tomorrow… I trust the second half brings you to the proper conclusion it did me.