Inconvenienced

Happy Friday. I just love Fridays!

A few weeks ago I was sitting out on my balcony reading. These two little girls, maybe eight years old – one my neighbor, the other her little friend, were playing in a common grassy outside my apartment.

Now I was delighted to see these little girls having so much fun. Love to hear children laugh. But every time they rolled down the hill, they’d squeal this sharp piercing shrill. Made me crazy. Boys don’t do that. I think I have sensitive ears anyway. Plus, you’d think these girls had just seen a 10-foot snake and then another and then another.

Over and over they kept squealing. I went inside my apartment for a few moments, and even with the sliding glass door closed I could still hear them. Finally, I couldn’t handle it any longer. I peered over my balcony and called to them most cordially.

“Girls, I’m really glad you’re having so much fun playing. But would you please stop screaming? It hurts my ears even in my house.”

I thought I said it pretty nice. Yet they looked at me nonplussed, like what are you even talking about? Nevertheless, they did stop. A little later, once again sitting out on my balcony reading, this one little girl, Haley, calls up to me. “Do you have some tape I can have?”

“Why?”

“Me and my friend want to build a fort with some newspaper.”

I shake my head so empathetically. “No I don’t. I’m sorry.”

“Okay.”

Conviction immediately set in. You do, too, have tape, the Lord prompted. You just don’t want to give it to her. They’re bugging you and you don’t feel like being nice to them at the moment.

Nailed.

So easy to think when I tell the Lord I want to please Him, He’s going to ask for some big sacrifice. Most the time, it’s no big sacrifice. Just not convenient. I don’t like to be inconvenienced unless I feel like doing something nice.

“Haley, I realized I do have tape. How much do you need? I can toss the dispenser down to you.”

“That’s okay. I only need two pieces. I’ll come up and get it.”

“Okay.”

And that’s all little Haley wanted from me. Two pieces of tape. She went off to build her fort with her little friend and within ten minutes had gotten bored and abandoned the project. Yet God had given me a second chance to be kind.

Loving others is inconvenient lots of times. Just don’t feel like going out of my way. Oh, I really do want to deep down. Just my emotions don’t. I understand that to say I love God who I can’t see and yet make no effort to love those around me who I can is pretty strong evidence that something’s wrong with my relationship with God. But God is ever kind, ever willing to give me what I need to act rightly in the moment. And in this case, an attitude adjustment was most needed.

I haven’t seen Haley recently. Maybe she’s moved. But I’m going to remember her for a while. God really exposed my selfishness that day. And so like Him, He used a sweet little girl who squeals when she’s happy, and just wanted to build a newspaper fort, to do it.

Have a great weekend everybody.

And if anyone gives even a cup of cold water to one of these little ones because he is my disciple, I tell you the truth, he will certainly not lose his reward.” (Matthew 10:24)