Wednesday, December 16, 2009

I Got Honked At Again Yesterday

It happened again. I got honked at yesterday.

I was coming from Maple Valley late afternoon yesterday after meeting a guy to sell him something I had put on craigslist (old subwoofer). I was in the SUV with the kids, and had just got done with the meeting.

Our new SUV is slick, but with a few slight issues. One of which is that when you close the rear door, if you don't slam it, the sensor tells you that it is open, and the lights stay on in the cab. Its frustrating, because you usually don't realize that it isn't fully closed until you are driving and the things beeps at you. Then you have to pull over, and open and close the back real hard to get it to close.

So I'm driving, and I'm about to turn into this business (turn signal on), and then I decide to go one more driveway to this car wash and pull into there.

That's when it happened. This Ford F150 lays out the horn on me- hoooooooooooonnnnnnkkkkkkkk. It must have lasted at least 3 seconds.

My first reply? "whatever dude, looks like your horn works". So I pull into the car wash, hop out, re-close the back, and I'm on my way.

That's when it happened. Traffic was so that within about 3 minutes, I was now behind the guy that honked at me. This is so rare that this happens. How often are you immediately behind the person that just honked at you? I was excited.

Payback. I was warming up my arm for a full blast fest on this guy. So sweet. So perfect. So wonderful. Such a great opportunity to get back at someone who just honked at me.

Then that little voice of the Holy Spirit started nagging at me. Man, I hate it when that happens. I had this great plan for honk revenge and the spirit of the Lord has to march in and start convicting me with all these Bible verses about turning the other cheek, and considering it pure joy when you face trials of many kinds. It was quite annoying.

So what did I do? Ab-so-lute-ly nothing. Nada. I pulled up behind the guy at the light and asked the kids what flavored Icees they wanted from the AMPM. Was it easy? No. Truth be told even a few hours after the incident I still wanted to go back and honk at that guy. Get him back. Make him feel like I felt. Rub it in his face. Honk at him longer and louder.

Can I get a witness?

Here's the deal- we all get hurt. We all get messed with, and the natural response is revenge. But that's not God's ideal. God's ideal is for us to allow him to avenge. Him to take care of it. Him to settle the score.

I'm waiting to see if the big horn from the sky is going to vindicate me. I'm not sure when or if he will, but that's the part of being a Christian that I still seem to be learning 19 years after becoming a follower of Christ. Knowing that he settles my scores, not me.

Is there something you need to let go? A vindication that you need to let him handle? Let it go today. Give it up. Its not easy to do, but its the right thing to do.

Be blessed
matt

1 comment:

  1. excellent message today Matt. It is amazing that God sends you a message when you need it most. This was it. Thanks.

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