Throwing Rocks

When I was a kid, we used to do some really dumb stuff. I remember living in an apartment complex when I was very young. There was no grass or yard of any kind... only concrete, a laundry room, and these big open stair wells that went to the upper floors of the complex. We used to run around this ‘playground’ and, not knowing any different, we made the best of it. I always had bruised shins and scraped knees... those concrete steps and sidewalks were really hard on a kid. I can remember playing with stuff like dryer lint (yes, dryer lint) that we collected from the laundry room and geckos... those little squishy looking lizards whose tails fall off with the slightest touch (no worries... they grow back).

Being kids, we were always looking for something more exciting to do. We ran around playing cops and robbers and one day we got the bright idea to have a ‘war’. We stationed ourselves under the two stairwells. Our weapons were the never ending supply of rocks on the ground at the base of the stairwells. We’d stick out heads out and wing a rock as hard as we could at our opponents, ducking back in as quickly as possible so we wouldn’t get hit by the flying rocks. This all went on for quite a while until some unlucky soul stuck their head out at the wrong moment and was blasted right above the eye by one of those rocks.

The fun was over. There was blood, swelling, pain and tears. The game no longer held the same fascination after we saw what could happen and we never played it again.

I was reminded of this story this morning at church, of all places. We watched a video ‘Are You Amazed’ and in it were many accounts of the life of Christ in which people were amazed. One of them was a story depicted in John chapter 8 where Jesus was teaching in the temple when the religious leaders brought in a woman who was caught in adultery. They made her stand before the group (what other motive than humiliation?) and said to Jesus, ‘Teacher, this woman was caught in the act of adultery.’ (No mention of the man, of course.) ‘In the Law Moses commanded us to stone such women. Now what do you say?’

This is one of my favorite pictures of the grace of God. I can just see Jesus as he bent down and started to write on the ground (it doesn’t say what he was writing, but some have speculated maybe a list of sins). The religious guys kept questioning him so he stands up and says simply ‘If any one of you is without sin, let him be the first to throw a stone at her.’ and he bent down and continued to write on the ground. Those who heard began to go away one at a time... the oldest first until only Jesus was left with the woman still standing there. Jesus stands up and asks her ‘Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?’ ‘No one, sir’ she answered. ‘Then neither do I condemn you,’ Jesus said. ‘Go now and leave your life of sin.’

How many times in life do we set ourselves up as the judge of others? How often do we look sadly at another’s sin, all the while ignoring our own? Just like that innocent game, our rock throwing can have very painful results... bruising hearts, crushing spirits, draining another's hope of ever being truly loved and accepted. Lord, help us see the damage our ‘rock throwing’ causes so we won’t ever want to play such a dangerous game.

Stranger than Fiction

Alex and I went to Hobby Lobby a few weeks ago. We had one of the strangest experiences I think I’ve ever had. I was looking for a ball to sit on an old iron candle stick I had out in the garden. We started in the clearance section because everything was 80% off. As we were browsing we found a few things that we liked and put them in the cart. When I shop at Hobby Lobby, I always put what I like in the cart and then at the end I usually have to go through and decide what I really need or want so I don’t spend too much money. I hadn’t been there in a while, and it is so much fun to go with Alex because we have a blast making fun and cracking jokes about some of the weird stuff we find. We tease each other and say ‘You REALLY need this’ about something totally outrageous, pose with objects, put on masks or whatever. They have some really strange stuff.

There were a lot of aisles on clearance… we must have arrived soon after they lowered the price to 80%. We found an awesome bowl that I actually wanted to buy when it was 50% off, but didn’t. The original price was $49.99 making it now $9.99. I put it in the cart and then saw a plate that I liked that was even less. As we were walking away I had the plate in my hand and a woman came up behind us and said in a very nasty tone ‘That’s mine.’ I said ‘Pardon me?’ and she said ‘this is my set… my cart was here’. There was no cart in sight. The aisle was completely empty the entire time we were there. I told her I got it off the shelf and she turned away and screamed ‘Mom!’ We went around the corner, but we could hear her frantically telling her mother how we had taken part of her set. She was so upset that I walked back around the corner and gave her the plate. She took it and didn’t even say thank you.

I went back around the corner and then we heard her scream out ‘Oh my God! Did she take that too?!!’ Then she came around the corner and looked in our cart at the bowl I had in the cart and went away babbling something like ‘I can’t believe it… she took that too.’ Then she came back with the plate and said ‘I don’t want this! I want that!’ She didn’t even give us a chance to respond, but walked back to her mom yelling ‘I can’t believe it!’ over and over.

By this time I was beginning to get angry and I had to walk away. I thought that I should have never given her the plate and I sure as heck wasn’t going to give her the bowl. As I was walking away, a thought occurred to me: All of a sudden, it was like God was reminding me that this was only a material thing and in the grand scheme of things, it didn’t matter one little bit. I picked up the bowl and went to give it back to her. She was still ranting and pacing up and down the aisle while her mother was standing there like she didn’t know what to do. I handed her mom the bowl and told her that I’m giving it back to her because of Jesus. She looked at me and said very enthusiastically ‘YEAH!’ and that was all. I walked away.

I felt kind of sick inside and so did Alex. We were so distracted by what just happened that we couldn’t really concentrate on what we were looking for. Alex was very upset at the woman’s unreasonable behavior. We got far away from them and rehashed the whole thing and had a good laugh about it. We prayed a quick prayer for her. That and the laugh made us both feel better. I told Alex that if she had calmly come to me and explained what had happened, that I probably wouldn’t have even hesitated to give her the things she said she had picked out. Her manner was rude and she seemed like a spoiled little brat who always got her way. Her calling out to her mom like she would fix it for her only enforced that feeling. She didn’t deserve to have the items… at all. The only way I could rectify the whole thing in my mind is to remember what I have that I don’t deserve… which is everything.

I made enough bad decisions when I was younger to have lost my freedom, health, sanity, children, family and even my life. I don’t know why I didn’t get what I deserved. Instead, I got (and continue to get) the mercy and love of a God who cares more for me than I can even imagine and who has used every terrible thing in my life for my good. I get peace, joy and hope in a world that can seem pretty hopeless at times. I get the opportunity to share that hope with my family and friends and even get to see some of them come to know the pure good that comes from knowing God through Jesus Christ. I get to watch my children survive terrible things that happen to them when all I can do is pray for them. I hear of desperate acts all around me… crimes and even suicides committed by those who have no hope and I can pray for those affected and thank God that I know what true hope is.

We left the incident behind and continued shopping. I didn’t get the bowl or the plate but I did get a reminder… a reminder to have grace for others because of the endless mercy and grace given to me. I wish I could remember that all the time.

John 1:16 And from his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace.