What do we do with those we can’t trust?
I’ve done a lot wrong things in my life. Even the things I’ve done since I’ve been saved are too many to count. There’s not enough money out there, to be worth showing every evil thought I’ve have on a public screen. Many times, since I’ve been a God-called, Baptistordained, and Statelicensed minister, I’ve found myself on the phone of shame apologizing for something that I said or did in the flesh. These were, and are, moments I regret. The worst feeling is the conviction I receive through the power of the Holy Spirit; when I have allowed myself to think, do, or say the unthinkable.
One of the worst things I had ever been told was someone saying they “just didn’t think they could trust me.” It was a month before my twenty seventh birthday, when I heard these words. While there was no gain in not having done what I had promised to, I had dropped the ball and then tried to cover it up. The truth was that I had always prided myself in being honest, even when I was brutal in doing so. It was something that I had always been taught. My memory stretches back to a day as a kid not even in school, as I vaguely recall, taking a two or three cent piece of candy from the store in Nicklesville. Daddy taught me a lesson that that day, which wouldn’t be forgotten physically or mentally.
Someone who I love with my whole heart lied to me. Immediately, I felt like my heart had been ripped out and stepped on. In anger, I began to think about what I should do to that person, if they dared to come clean. Soon after, I realized… that’s what today’s article would be about. What do we do with those we can’t trust? So we look to scripture for a WDJD answers. What did Jesus do? Jesus loved them. Not only did He continue to love them with all of His heart; Christ even suffered the consequence of the guilty to provide a way for them to escape it. Over and over again, Jesus extends an offer of justification through His shed blood to everyone. He gives the opportunity to those who will reach forward in faith to receive it, and even those that He knew never would.
I retreat to the Word of God found in 2nd Corinthians 2:1,2 where Paul said to the church at Corinth, “But I determined this within myself, that I would not come again to you in sorrow. For if I make you sorrowful, then who is he who makes me glad but the one who is made sorrowful by me?” In other words, Paul had made up His mind, that he wouldn’t make another painful visit to them. After all, if he brought pain to them, the only one that could make him glad, was the very one that Paul himself had caused pain to. Jesus!
How could Paul not share the grace that was given to him by Christ? How can we not? Show kindness to those you can’t trust. They’re in enough pain already. Be Blessed.