Grace
A blogger friend of mine is grieving his failed marriage. Despite his own fascinatingly checkered past, he remained true to his wife, cherished their marriage, and adores their toddler daughter. But the union ended, through no major fault of his.As blog writers and blog readers, all we really know of each other is what we choose to share of ourselves. But, much the way our brains fill in a missing letter in a wrd in order to make sense of it, we tend to fill out the empty places in the bloggers' self portraits and believe we really do know them.
In a recent post, my friend wrote yet again of his pain and his grief, and he pondered exposing all of his estranged wife's failings and hurts to him. He pondered, but he did not act.
One reader-commenter said he was being gallant. I thought about the post for a few days and then reached this conclusion:
The God that my friend doesn't acknowledge created mankind in His image. One way of thinking about that is "There is that of God in every person."
One of the sublime and basically incomprehensible characteristics of God is grace. Grace, as in mercy toward one who is undeserving, a kindness rendered by one who is not required to do so.
As a Lutheran who spends her days with Quakers, I claim to recognize Grace when I see it.
What is intriguing me today is the new profound awareness that even those who do not believe God exists have been created in His image and, therefore, do godly things unaware.
Comments
hugz
Pam
A friend of ours, actually one of my husband's best friends, and I knew him well in another context, NEVER said one bad word about his wife or that the marriage was in trouble. I didn't know her well then, but what she did say, after they split was that, of course, he was the problem. Observing her in several contexts in the next few years made me realize that she had mental problems and didn't even fulfill her job very well.
I give the male person in that situation high praise for not saying anything negative. It was grace, as you say. They are both people of faith, but she didn't act graceful. We can't know what goes on behind closed doors, but we can see that actions in other contexts reflect on our character.
(Oh! Sorry! Spoiled the mood, didn't I?) :-)
On topic, though, I was just discussing grace with my husband's niece over Christmas and was reminded yet again what an amazing thing it is. (No cliche intended.) I think I'll try to make grace my "thing" for 2010 -- something to aim for in my own actions, something to recognize in others, and a prism to see God at work in the world.
Lovely and thought-provoking post.
Whatever one believes, how we treat each other reflects not only on the other person but on ourselves. There is a wonderful children's book called " How full is your bucket?" and the story is about a young boy who learns this lesson from his grandfather. The grandfather talks about if we put down others then we not only take from another's person's bucket but we take from our own bucket of life.
The other thing that I thought about was that my parents always made a point to not say things out of anger or hurt because once said they could not be taken back. Perhaps your blog friend was given those same lessons - he is be commended particularly because there is a young child involved.
Nice reflective piece Nancy
Regards,
Anna
In Minnesota, we currently have a candidate for governor who has been in various government positions a long time, including in the US senate. He has recently been very honest about falling off the wagon while in office. What will that admission do to him? Maybe that honesty will resonate with some people, but I'm sure there will be buzzards, not graceful doves.
~a