Moments and Chances for Grace-Giving

I sat at the restaurant table frustrated…could this really be happening?

{Their menu had changed again, for the fourth time in a year, and I suppose they think it is creative marketing to always be reinventing their menu.}

But why must they ALWAYS eliminate my favorite dish?

And so I ordered something similar,

…or so I thought.

And I enjoyed the bread with balsamic vinegar and oil,

…once they finally brought it (after spilling it first, all over the table).

And I loved my mango iced tea,

…once they brought more ice so it was actually iced,

…and once they brought Splenda after my 2nd request.

But I never loved my new dish,

…even after the pasta was changed,

…and the new one was brought (now with the wrong sauce full of  overwhelming garlic cream).

Could this really be happening?? Inefficiency is SO irritating!

Was it laziness, or apathy, or oversight?…lack of skill, or training, or direction?

“I have a need to get exactly what I ordered,” I thought…

And no sooner had my thoughts raced, and my emotion escalated, that I was jolted by a still small voice…

A whisper to my heart,

…a thought {from Him} that just came,

…screeching to a halt my intense irritation within. {sigh}

 

Isn’t ALL a gift…even this?

…even the irritation and frustration?

 

Maybe this is exactly what I needed tonight. Exactly what He had prepared for me. More chances to die to my corrupted-self-centered self.

Moments and chances to take my prideful indignance and my entitlement attitude, and choose instead to smother them with grace-giving,

…to breathe in the freshness and freedom that forgiveness can bring

…to take my love of self and drive it out by nailing an extension of grace in its place.

Galatians 5:14

For the whole Law is fulfilled in one word, in the statement, “ YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF.”

 

Even THIS, this irritating restaurant moment, begging grace. With new moments and chances for me to give.

…to emerge in new growth,

…to sprout kindness, and tenderness,

…to overlook,

…and to forgive, with newness of life,

…as I have been forgiven.

Ephesians 4:32

Be kind to one another, tender-hearted, forgiving each other, just as God in Christ also has forgiven you.

 

For what do I really deserve except death? MY sin and stubbornness a certain irritation to a good and holy God.

Yet because of His generous grace-gift…because of His great love with which He loves us…

I have been given life.

I am justified and forgiven.

I have been pardoned and am alive…

Colossians 2:13-14

When you were dead in your transgressions and the uncircumcision of your flesh, He made you alive together with Him, having forgiven us all our transgressions, having canceled out the certificate of debt consisting of decrees against us, which was hostile to us; and He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross.

 

And isn’t just this, more than I actually deserve?

And isn’t everything beyond it also a gift?

Even the trivial irritations and marginal inconveniences…

Even the disorganization and inefficiencies…

All of them presenting me with a choice to follow in my Savior’s footsteps…

To die to self and emerge anew.

To put on humility, reaching beyond myself.

To gain a realistic perspective, {His perspective}, of new moments,

ALL moments, as chances for grace-giving,

…these endless opportunities to emulate the example of my Savior,

…to emerge with newness of life.

…to love as He loved.

…to give grace as He gave.

…to forgive as I have been forgiven.

Ephesians 4:20-24

But you did not learn Christ in this way, if indeed you have heard Him and have been taught in Him, just as truth is in Jesus, that, in reference to your former manner of life, you lay aside the old self, which is being corrupted in accordance with the lusts of deceit, and that you be renewed in the spirit of your mind, and put on the new self, which in the likeness of God has been created in righteousness and holiness of the truth.

 

What a daily journey… an hourly surrender minute by minute, to live…

To really live THIS.

And I wish I could say I seized that moment at that restaurant, and implemented my epiphany at that table. But it was the manager who exemplified the grace, not me, as he removed the charges from our bill. {sigh}

And even though I failed that night, I’m thankful for the lesson of that small whisper from Him, and the many future moments and chances I will have for grace giving. And in them to be being made more and more into His likeness, with each and every new moment and chance.

May your moments of death to self be easier each time, and may your journey lead you to many chances for the giving of graces and the freedom of life it brings!

How has your failure changed you? 

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Hope and Thanks Ordinarily Extraordinary! For When You Encounter Prickly People :: Sermon on the Mount {Week 11}