Yesterday, was a pretty awful day. One of those days that everything was just "off", you know? Have you had one lately? But that is completely beside the point now.
Today started differently, quietly, peacefully, only one minor crisis before church. That taken care of and I was only 15 minutes late. What a wonderful time we had in Bible Study, Church service and sermon were wonderful and thought provoking. A trip to Walmart was next that proved a little Iffy, if you know what I mean. Next, a quick trip to Las Cruces to deliver something that belonged to someone else, a quick stop at my aunt and uncles house to wish them Happy New Year and the road home for the evening.
Not that any of this really matters to the important part of my story, but here it is..... We decided that French toast sounded pretty wonderful so IHop it was. Dinner started out by ordering brioche French toast that they were out of, and having to go check and see if they still had any of the cheesecake stuffed French Toast left as their new promotion starts tomorrow. Our waiter came back, told me I could get my order of the cheesecake and that they could make the bananas foster French toast out of regular French toast.... Life was good again. Then he came back again and told us that the Owner had found some brioche so the other two were getting their first order as well. Our food came, we ate, it was good.....
THEN.........A young man who was sitting alone stood up and came over to our table. He asked if we were out for the New Year and were we doing anything else this evening or was "this" it. We assured him that from here we were calling it a night and going home. He then begins to tell us that he wants to end his year on a good note and do something nice. He wanted to know if it would be all right with us if he paid for our dinner. Stop action..........
What do you do in a moment like that? How do you respond? We were perfectly capable of paying for our own meal. He is obviously an airman sitting alone on a holiday evening, shouldn't WE be paying for HIS meal? Is he up for adoption? But then, a little voice somewhere says, he wants to do this. Don't take his blessing away from him. Ok, I wont, but looking up at this young man and telling him we would be honored if he paid for our meal was probably one of the harder things I have done lately. It some how took a whole LOT of humility to say what I said. I knew it was the right thing to do but wow..... After we got in the car and were on our way home, and we were talking about it, we all three agreed that having never had something like that happen before none of us were sure how to react in the moment.
Start action.........
Before we got home, I can tell you that I shed a few quiet tears over the whole episode.
So with this story being told, How do I see the end of 2017? A lesson in blessing others through small acts. A lesson in humility to give someone else the opportunity to be a blessing and receive a blessing... A lesson in taking a moment to see the world around you in a different way if just for a moment.
So how will I start out 2018? Looking for the moment God wants to use ME to pay that small act of kindness forward as I promised that young man I would. Looking for the moment that someone else might be able to see God IN me. In 2018, may there be less of ME in the way so that there can be more of GOD!!!!!!
No comments:
Post a Comment