Hindsight
Jesus commands us to be second mile
people. Roman soldiers could order
any male citizen of Israel to carry his 70-85 lb. backpack one mile. Yet in addition, Jesus says go a second mile as
a volunteer, out of love, serve God by loving your neighbor and contributing a
second mile. What a tough character challenge! Thinking of Roman Soldiers as the neighbors Jesus had in
mind.
I know I have a difficult time going a
second mile with certain people situations:
When I feel someone has been
irresponsible, I think to myself: they’ve made their bed now they can sleep in
it! They brought this upon
themselves. They’re just reaping
what they’ve sown! Do you think
that way?
Do you think there were Roman citizens
who got drunk and irresponsibly joined the Roman army? Shouldn’t he have had to carry his own
backpack? People who were forced
to carry the backpacks for soldiers could have said, “They’ve made their bed
now…?”
When I feel someone has been rude. For example, I’m in a department store
spending my money and this clerk is
rude or slow or apathetic or moody or just not very helpful. I just can’t help thinking, “Why should
I go the extra mile and be kind and polite to them?”
Do you think there was ever a rude Roman
soldier? Rome didn’t have a
foreign service Miss Manners program
to prepare their soldiers so they wouldn’t insult the Barbarians over which
they ruled!
When I feel someone has been unwilling to
go a second mile for me I’m not motivated to go a second mile for them. This is just the generic human
performance response. You do something good for me and I’ll do something good
for you. But Jesus says to go to the
heavenly performance level. So even
if someone does something evil to you do something good for them. Sometimes Jesus really bugs me!
Many years ago our Board gave me the directive to hire an architect to do all the plans to renovate our offices. The firm that I hired called me a few
weeks into the project and asked if I could forward them a payment because
business was slow and they had to make payroll. So the church advanced a payment of $2,000.00 based partly
on work that was already done and work that was to be done. It allowed that firm to make payroll. They finished all the work and
completely earned the advance.
A couple of months later I asked this
same person if they’d drop by for 10 minutes and give another area a quick look
to let me know if they’d be interested in more work. They charged me for a consultation! That was 22 years ago and I can still
tell the story like it was yesterday.
I’m not a very good poster child for the 2nd Mile
Program.
I want
to be a second Mile Person! I want to be a member of the rare breed
who commits to serving Jesus above their own “being taken advantage of”
feelings. A commitment to serve Jesus
is a commitment to love our neighbor as ourselves. The Great Commission of Jesus is a commission to wed works
with words and walk a second mile while talking about Jesus the Savior. Ironically, the more we go the second
mile the better we get at it. So
be prepared for opportunities to go a second mile!
Further your search:
No comments:
Post a Comment