Another Devotion got me thinking, weird how that work, Huh? I have seen and been involved with people who hold grudges or resentment in their hearts before they actually take care of them. I want you to read this devotion thought before I continue.
I read a humorous story about a man and woman who had been married for more than 60 years. They had shared everything. They had talked about everything. They had kept no secrets from each other except that the woman had a shoebox in the top of her closet about which she had cautioned her husband never to open. Over the years, the man forgot about the box until the woman became very sick.
While sorting out their affairs, the elderly man took down the shoebox and took it to his wife’s bedside. She agreed that it was time for him to know the contents of the box. When he opened it, he found two crocheted dolls and a stack of money totaling $25,000.
Curious, the man asked her about the contents. “When we were to be married,” she began, “my grandmother told me the secret to a happy marriage was to never argue. She told me that if I ever got angry with you, I should just keep quiet and crochet a doll.” The man was so moved he had to fight back tears.
Only two precious dolls were in the box. Apparently, she had only been angry with him two times in all those years of living and loving. He almost burst with happiness.
“Honey,” he said, “that explains the dolls, but what about all of this money? Where did it come from?” “Oh,” she said, “That’s the money I made from selling all the dolls.”
I’ll admit, I got a good chuckle from this story, but in reality it’s no way to handle conflict in relationships. In the above Scripture, Paul warns us not to end a day angry with another person. He knew the power of anger and how the devil waits to seize any opportunity to increase division among believers. Unresolved anger leads to bitterness, a lack of forgiveness and it causes immeasurable pain to those involved. Today, choose to be a peacemaker and resolve any outstanding conflict.
The verse that was used was this:
In your anger do not sin! Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry, and do not give the devil a foothold.
Ephesians 4:26-27
As I was reading this, this brought back a story that happen to me. As most of you know, I work with students and LOVE it and as of right now in my life can not seeing me doing anything else but a few years ago, I offended a student with words that I thought were not offensive but in this students mind it was very offensive. Well this student stop coming because of my words, but was never told of this (I was given every other excuse why) until a year ago from the mom. I found out that this student started attending another youth group and I was happy for this student and asked how they were doing and that is when I was told about the incident. All I said on that night a few years ago was “Oh I am glad that you could grace us with your presence”. Now to you and at the time to me that didn’t seem to offensive, but to the student it was very offensive.
What did I do? I immediately called this person up and apologized and told the student that I wish they would have come to me that night. many years went by until the truth was revealed, I don’t know what would have happened to the student if they would have come to me on that night but as you can see their was anger built up that did not need to be.
So as you go about your day, think on these things.
Spend some time evaluating your relationships.
Is there someone in your life with whom you have unresolved conflict? If there is, commit to taking steps to resolve the conflict.
