This got me thinking about our relationships.
Anyway, when the time came to clean up the dishes I used to cook everything, I found that the maple syrup leftovers in the walnut saucepan were pretty difficult to remove. Totally worth it for the sake of flavor. But a stinker of a clean up session.
This got me thinking about our relationships. I’ve been talking with other leaders lately about how we have to be willing to confront things when they are out of order sometimes. Of course, we were discussing this in the framework of leadership, but I think it applies to our personal relationships, too.
If we are going to do anything worthwhile, we will likely need other people in the boat with us; we will need relationships. And if we plan to have any meaningful relationships in our lives, then we have to learn to navigate messiness. We can’t just get rid of people at the first sign of offense.
We can’t just get rid of people at the first sign of offense.
I’m the type of person who wants to deal with things immediately when there’s been an offense or some other type of discord. I want to have the tough conversations, confront the issues, and hopefully move forward in unity. And all of that as soon as possible.
But I’m learning the beauty of taking it slow. I was recently having a hard time processing how I felt about conversation with a friend. There wasn’t anything inherently wrong or offensive that took place. I just left the conversation feeling uneasy. I needed time to pause and figure out what exactly wasn’t sitting right with me and why.
So I went against my natural instinct to call this person back and process with them. Instead, I went to bed. Woke up the next day, processed with Jesus, asked the person for a good time to chat, then waited. Eight hours. I waited all day. But by the time they called me, I was thrilled to hear from them, totally removed from all negative emotion, and able to gain more understanding from them. A perfect conversation.
We must be slow to anger because He is slow to anger. We must be compassionate because He is compassionate.
But I had to take it slow.
James 1:19 NLT:
Understand this, my dear brothers and sisters: You must all be quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to get angry.
Psalm 103:8:
The Lord is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in love.
We must be slow to anger because He is slow to anger. We must be compassionate because He is compassionate. And we can demonstrate our compassion by being quick to listen.
The process to get to the good part was messy.
Take the walnuts, for example. Those suckers were so good! So tasty! But the process to get to the good part was messy. When it came time to clean that saucepan, the maple syrup had hardened. Water wasn’t really working, and the sponge I was using kept shredding with each scrub.
So I got the dish soap, sprayed it all over the pan and the spatula, then let it sit for a few minutes. Gave it break. Then I turned the water on again. Not full power, but full-ish. Not totally hot, but hot-ish. And I started cleaning the pan. Gently scrubbing. It took a little longer, but it came out clean.
Avoidance creates a whole new mess and a whole new problem. So take it slow.
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