Soul Rhythms » yslamb

Dealing with your new normal

yslamb — Sat, 28 Aug 2010 14:59:23 +0000

Sometimes life crashes in on us with such force that it changes our normal way of being. That’s what happened five years ago in New Orleans. Charles Evans was trapped at the New Orleans Convention Center with thousands of other desperate New Orleans residents following Hurricane Katrina.

Then age 9, Charles touched my heart when he stared into the camera and declared: “We just need some help out here. It’s so pitiful.”

I saw Charles again today on television. The 14-year-old told NBC broadcaster Lester Holt that Hurricane Katrina was “like a scary movie that I would not want to see again.”

Some 1,800 people died after hurricane-swirled waters crashed through levees and flooded 80 percent of the city. Hundreds of thousands people were displaced, businesses were destroyed and many people left for places far away.

Holt told viewers that he returned to New Orleans on the fifth anniversary of Katrina to see if life had gotten back to normal. For many, many people there, it hasn’t and it won’t. Many have had to deal with a new normal.

I met a family of four nearly five years ago who moved to Savannah after Hurricane Katrina destroyed their home and their lives as they knew them there. They were blessed to meet people in Savannah who helped them get settled and find work. Now that family is doing well and enjoying their new city. They have no plans of returning to New Orleans.

Charles says he wishes “that things would kind of be back to normal” in his city, but he recognizes that may not happen. “New Orleans is not back to normal,” he said. “You know, a lot of people may think that it is, but it is not.”

In the five years since Hurricane Katrina, thousands of people in different parts of the country and the world also have had to deal with natural and man-made disasters that have upended the normal flow of their lives. What use to be isn’t anymore for so many people due to hurricanes, tsunamis, tornadoes, earthquakes, volcanoes eruptions, snow storms, terrorist’s attacks, mine collapses and oil rig explosions. Floods in Pakistan from month-long monsoon rains have claimed the lives of nearly 1,700 and left homeless millions more. And the rains and the floods are continuing to bring calamity. (Photo from the Associated Press)

What happened in New Orleans five years ago, which was captured in all its misery and despair on television, was unimaginable. But since then, so are the disasters in Haiti and more recently Pakistan. We are not living in normal times.

While our personal storms may not compare with what Charles and millions of others have suffered and are suffering, some of us have encountered some our own earth-shattering events that have caused us to rethink at times how we continue to live our lives. Deaths of loved ones, lost of mortgages, job terminations, children in trouble, illnesses, divorce, to name a few.

I have learned that when my normal has been upset to turn quickly in prayer to the one person that is constant. God is unchanging. Faith in Him is the only way that I can deal when my way of living, thinking and doing has been turned upside down. When I trust in God, I don’t as easily lapse into wishing that things would be like they use to be. Instead, I look forward in hope for something much better than before.

How did you deal with the seismic changes in your life? What lessons, if any, have you learned from observing what happned in New Orleans about dealing with life-altering disaster?

Moving beyond anger to do good

yslamb — Wed, 25 Aug 2010 23:03:33 +0000

“Are you angry, bitter, ticked off?” the CNN commentator asked Shirley Sherrod, who yesterday said no to a job offer from the man who fired her weeks ago.

Sherrod, as you may recall, is the former Agriculture Department official from Georgia who was summarily dismissed by the big boss at the USDA when a conservative blogger posted an edited video that made her appear to be bigoted against a white farmer.

Her life has been a roller coaster since the story broke in July. Along with being fired from her job, she was repudiated by the NAACP and vilified in the press before the truth came out. Apologies followed but the sting remains. However, is this black woman angry, bitter or ticked off? She says no and therein for me lies something else in her story, which I blogged about earlier, to consider.

Sherrod, who looked and sounded weary yesterday, said in the CNN interview that the events of the last few weeks made it difficult for her to accept another position at the Agriculture Department right now.

To the question of being angry, she answered:

“You know, I can’t even get angry. I wish I were an individual who could get angry and stay angry for a while. I guess if I could. you would have seen a different Shirley Sherrod throughout this.

But I can’t be angry. If you’re angry, you can’t think straight. You can’t move forward. You’re stuck at a point. I’m at the point where I think we need to move on and make some of the good changes we need to make for this country. You cannot do it, if you are angry.”

Sherrod’s comment struck me when I heard them. Anger has undone many a good women and has led to strained or severed relationships. Some of us, even those of us in the church, carry anger for years over what someone has done to us. Just recently, I heard a friend talk about an incident that occurred more than a decade ago that still had her seething. She has not been able to let go of the anger and seemed to take some righteous comfort in holding on it. In the meanwhile, relationships with family members suffer because of it.

When we harbor anger in our hearts against someone who has offended us, we cannot have real peace in our lives. Whenever we see that person, the anger once again burns fresh within us. Our anger spills over to others and impacts our faith walk. (There is a righteous anger that we are expected to have when we see gross injustices taking place in the world, but that’s not what I am talking about here.)

Letting go of anger before it takes control of us, or hardens a part of our heart, is one of the most liberating things we can do. I know. Anger was my companion for many years before, with God’s help, I did something about the damage it was doing to my spirit and my relationships. I learned to forgive myself and the person who angered me, and to ask for forgiveness when I am the one causing harm. And I make every effort to not let anger smother too long.

My guidebook for daily living tells me several things about dealing with anger that I try to adopt when situations occur that could cause me to become angry.

Be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to get angry.” (James 1:19)
Don’t sin by letting anger control you. (Ephesians 4:26)
Don’t let the sun go down while you are still angry. (Ephesians 4: 26)
Get rid of all bitterness, rage, anger, harsh words, slander… and love and forgive as God has forgiven you. (Ephesians 4: 31)

The Bible tells us that human anger does not produce the righteousness God desires. (James 1:20) Maybe Sherrod knows that. She is able to move forward with her mind set on accomplishing good.

What about you? Are you still angry over something someone did to you? What step can you take today to move beyond the anger toward peace?

Unleashing the power within

yslamb — Mon, 23 Aug 2010 21:46:43 +0000

What would happen today if I fully uncorked the power that resides within me? What if you did the same? Just imagine if women of God of all shades stopped today and really lived Philippians 4:13 without doubt and fear. What would happen if African American women, some of the strongest women created by God, unleashed their spiritual power in the world? Not their intelligence, their beauty, their cunning (or conniving), their mother wit, their earning power or their political power- but their spiritual power?

If we really believe that we can do all things through Him who strengthens us, what would we do to make a difference in this world, in our communities, our homes? How would we build up God’s kingdom on earth?

Or what’s stopping us if we believe what Matthew 17:20 says: “I tell you the truth, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there’ and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you.”

Maybe we don’t believe. Or just not enough.

All weekend I heard messages about God’s power and how He wants to work through willing vessels to accomplish His will. At a women’s symposium Friday night at a church in Silver Spring, MD, the speaker talked about women standing firm and being obedient to God’s word. We can become conduits of God’s power, she said.

Donna Partow talked about the importance of praying, trusting God and seeking His peace for our lives. “The time is so critical we can’t afford to be women in turmoil,” she told the women.

On Sunday, I attended two services where both ministers expounded on allowing God’s power to be at work in our lives. At the early-morning service, the 20-year-old minister talked about getting past the things that distract us from doing what we are suppose to do for God. The other preacher entitled his sermon, “OMG” (Oh My God in text shorthand) and used one of my favorite Scriptures, Ephesians 3:20-21, to bring home the message that we must stay connected to our power source . Which goes:

“Now to Him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that works in us, to Him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen.”

For those of you who are already using the power within to do God’s work in the world, may God bless you to prosper as you glorify Him. To the rest of us, let’s fully uncork the bottle of our potential and let the power of God lead us to do some amazing things this week.

A final thought from this quote, which I have also used over the years to spur me on:

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won’t feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It’s not just in some of us; it’s in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.” – Marianne Williamson

Ready to leap for joy

yslamb — Fri, 20 Aug 2010 21:24:04 +0000

A convergence of circumstances has me thinking about joy and how it is manifested in my life. But it was a conversation with a friend earlier this week that really sent me into a bout of navel gazing, as another friend once described my labored thought-process.

Basically, my long-time friend told me Wednesday that I did not act like someone who had joy – you know that bubbling over expression of God’s love and presence that emanates from the inside. (My definition.) She went on to say that she had another friend who always seemed ready to tell someone about her faith and did it enthusiastically, joyfully.

“You’re too controlled. You’re still holding back,” she said, noting some of the blogs she had read.

I do have joy, I protested as we continued on for a few minutes more. I guess everyone expresses their faith differently, she concluded. Yes, everyone’s soul rhythm carries a distinct ebb and flow.

But, different or not, I’ve come to the point in my walk of faith where I want the joy of the Lord to be evident in my life. Joy is one of the nine Fruit of the Spirit that as a believer I should be producing in my life and passing on to others. It is more than an emotion that waxes and wanes with our circumstances; it is something beyond being happy. Joy is a deep delight, an inner abiding in the ways of God, no matter what negative situations are impinging on your life.

And I know without a doubt that the joy of the Lord is my strength, because I would not have had the stamina to go through some of my most difficult life challenges without that joy. I still may not smile as much as I should but I still have joy, as the song goes. (This version of the song by Tye Tribbett is exuberant. Take a listen.)

Yesterday, a friend posted on her Facebook status: “Good morning, Facefriends! Carpe Gaudium (“Seize joy” – and if you do, then you’ll have the day)!”

It encouraged me to continue on my journey to joy and remained me of a movie scene that I saw on television a few weeks ago. In the movie, whose title escapes me, Angelina Jolie was playing a spy (no not Salt) and in one scene, she and a male spy were running from some bad guys. The two ran to the top of a construction site, retrieved and donned two winged jumpsuits that were hidden there.

Just as the bad guys approached them with guns blazing, Jolie and her companion jumped off the edge of the building. They soared through the sky with abandon and left their pursuers shaking their heads in amazement.

That scene has stayed with me. That’s the kind of joy I want, a soaring joy that comes from living a life of freedom in Christ Jesus.

“This is the true JOY in life, the being used for a purpose recognized by yourself as a mighty one; the being thoroughly worn out before you are thrown on the scrap heap; the being a force of Nature instead of a feverish selfish little clod of ailments and grievances complaining that the world will not devote itself to making you happy.”
– George Bernard Shaw

What about you? How is the joy of the Lord demonstrated in your life?

Pray at 3 p.m. for 30 days for our children

yslamb — Wed, 18 Aug 2010 21:59:22 +0000

Something has got to change. And it has got to be us. Our children need us. They need our fervent prayers and our active involvement in their lives. They need their mothers, aunties, sisters and female cousins and friends to nurture them into wholeness and to help keep them away from paths that lead to their destruction. They need their fathers, uncles, brothers and male cousins and friends to encourage them, uphold them and them show the way to living godly, purposeful lives. Our African American children need us.

Even if you do not have any children to call your own, the children in your church, your neighborhood, on the subway you ride, that you encounter in the supermarket need to know that there is someone who cares or can care about them. This can be tricky, I know, after observing this week a young girl drape her leg over a subway seat almost defying someone to sit next to her and another playing her music so loud as if to annoy.

Unfortunately, too many of our young girls and boys are acting as if their lives are like throw-away candy wrappers. And too many of us see them as litter on the street. I’ve seen the scowls of disapproval on some adult faces as they encounter sulking girls or pass congregating groups of boys, and I’ve felt the scowl inch onto my own face.

Something has got to change. Consider this newly released report from the Schott Foundation that says that our public schools are failing nearly half of the country’s black male students.

“Taken together, the numbers in the Schott Foundation for Public Education’s report form a nightmarish picture―one that is all the more frightening for being both true and long-standing,” said Geoffrey Canada, president and CEO of the Harlem Children’s Zone, who provided the foreword in the report. “These boys are failing, but I believe that it is the responsibility of the adults around them to turn these trajectories around. All of us must ensure that we level the playing field for the hundreds of thousands of children who are at risk of continuing the cycle of generational poverty. The key to success is EDUCATION.” (Photo of Canada applauding a student’s achievement is from the Harlem Children’s Zone website.)

Consider this broadcast report from NBC news correspondent Lester Holt, which aired Sunday on DATELINE NBC about the gang and gun violence in Chicago that has become a centerpiece for kids killing kids. The parents of a 16-year-old college-bound young man, Blair Holt, who died in the cross-fires of a gang shooting on a city bus are standing up against gun violence. They started a group with other parents called Purpose on Pain and are advocating an end to gun violence. Here is Annette Nance-Holt’s story about how gun violence caused her son’s death and changed her life.

Consider this news story two weeks ago in which 70 young people in Washington, D.C., stunned the city by fighting one Friday night on the otherwise relatively violence-free Metro. Seventy kids. What were they thinking! Fortunately, no guns or knives were involved and only four people required medical treatment.

The young people who need our help are not just kids who have grown up undisciplined and having to fend for themselves from young ages. Or those who never knew their father’s love or felt a mother’s embrace, or those who live in poverty and neglect. All our children–the ones who are trying their best to make right decisions and those who don’t seem to be able to– need our unfailing love, attention and support.

Recently when my son, who made it through high school and was in college, stood before a judge, she looked directly at my husband and me sitting in the courtroom. “I’m talking to the parents right now,” she began. She said increasingly she is seeing boys younger than my son from good homes coming before her. They are doing stupid things, she said, but the consequences can be grave.

Most of us are or at least try to be good parents, doing the right things for our children. I know I have tried and will continue to try. And yet, as I look at this current generation, I can see that more has to be done for all of our youth.

I’ll talk more about this in other blogs and solicit suggestions for what we can do and what is being done to reverse the direction of some of our boys and girls. As Lester Holt and the Schott Foundation both pointed out, some good efforts are being made to help young people survive and thrive in this society.

In the meantime, please join me in praying a special prayer for our children during the next 30 days, everyday at 3 p.m.

Pray as the Spirit leads you for the children in your home, your family, your neighborhood, your church, and your children’s schools. Include praying for God’s protection, direction and revelation over their lives.

Pray for a movement of God unlike any we have ever seen before so that this generation of young people will live up to their godly inheritance.

James 5:13 tells us and I believe it: “The earnest prayers of a righteous person have great power and produces wonderful results.” NLT

Let me know if you will join this prayer effort.

Bless and be blessed

yslamb — Mon, 16 Aug 2010 23:07:57 +0000

My original best friend, as she calls herself, blessed me last month with a daily devotional for my birthday. Leetta really enjoys reading the encouraging words of this young minister from Singapore and wanted to share them with me. The daily reflections, written by Joseph Prince and entitled “Destined to Reign,” have opened up my heart and mind to more of the knowledge of God’s grace in my life.

I am blessed each time I open the book and today was no exception. The reading reinforced for me how important it is for us to bless each other as often as possible. The lesson focused on speaking blessings over your family and encourages us with this thought of the day:

“Pronounce God’s blessings over your children and they will grow up to be winners in the fight of life.”

Prince also urges us to bless our loved ones by declaring over them the words from Psalm 5:12: “The Lord blesses you and surrounds you with His favor as with a shield.”

I heard a similar message a few years ago while attending a College of Prayer module presented by Cheryl Sacks, a well-known prayer leader, who also talked about the power of blessing our family and friends. I also came across a book sometimes ago by author David Spangler who taught classes on the art and practice of blessings.

Experience has taught me that blessing another person is a holy act that each of us can perform. It is a divine transaction of us releasing the power of God in us to touch the life of another person in ways we cannot imagine. Countless people have blessed my life and I am sure many of them did not even know they were doing it.

In the course of what may be an ordinary day for us, a person’s life could be transformed when we offer a hopeful word, a warm smile, a helping hand, a good attitude in a bad situation, a silent prayer. Just think of the life-changing influence you can have when you are intentional in being a blessing to someone.

Yesterday at church, praises filled the room as a member told in trembling voice how she had received an anonymous monetary gift that morning so that she could attend our upcoming women’s retreat. Shortly afterwards, a senior sister stood and offered to pay for five other women to attend the October retreat. What a blessing!

Today, bless someone and create a chain of blessings that can bring Heaven to earth. Release the God in you into the world and see for yourself the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living.

Here is a prayer I adapted from Ephesians 3: 14-20 that I hope blesses you today.

I pray today to God, the Creator of everything in heaven and earth, that from His glorious, unlimited resources He will empower you with inner strength though His Spirit. I pray that with Christ living in your heart through faith, you will be rooted in God’s love and remain strong. I pray that you will come to know and truly understand, as all God’s peoples should, how wide, how long, how high and how deep God’s love is. May you experience the love of Christ, even as it is too great to fully comprehend, and be filled with the fullness of God.

Know always, and cling to this knowledge, that God is able to do above and beyond, to accomplish infinitely more, that we could ever ask or imagine. May you feel the love of God in a special way today – and pass it on. Amen.

How has someone blessed you recently?

Seeing and praising God’s benefits

Wake up to joy

yslamb — Mon, 09 Aug 2010 18:39:50 +0000

From the time my eyes opened fully this morning, the vamp of a rousing Christian song started running though my mind. And it hasn’t stopped yet. It goes “Wake up joy is here. Wake up. Wake up joy is here. Wake up!”

That’s a message that’s good for any day of the week, any moment of the day.

Gospel group Israel and New Breed belts out the song, which is entitled, “Trading My Sorrows,” with spirit-filled gusto. It always gives me an extra bounce when I hear it. So to wake up with it playing in my head just signals to me that today is going to be a great day, no matter what.

The news today is filled with depressing stories (what’s new there?); a couple of family issues have me concerned (if it not one thing, it’s another.) ; and I’ve got a long list of important things to get done before night falls (who doesn’t?). But before I allow myself to be overwhelmed by any of it, I am going to let the words I heard first thing this morning continue to run in my mind like a CD on automatic replay.

I am encouraged today also by the testimonies I heard yesterday from members of my church. We sometimes open space in our Sunday services for members to tell of God’s working in their lives, and yesterday a communal blessing filled the sanctuary as the members related their stories of overcoming sadness, breaking through financial strains, experiencing physical healing and surviving storm damage. What started as distresses for them ended in rejoicing.

They know that the joy of the Lord is their strength and believe as the Scripture says, “Weeping may endure for a night but joy comes in the morning.” For all those waiting for night and day to pass again before experiencing joy, Israel and New Breed sings that “Morning is not necessarily what has an AM next ot it. Morning happens when you wake up.” Even now.

Darrell Evans wrote “Trading My Sorrows”, which was birth spontaneously out of a worship service, in 1997 and calls it one of the powerful songs he has ever written. The song has become one of the most sung worship choruses in churches around the world, according to Crosswalk .com.

In this song about “trading sorrows , sickness and pain and laying them down for the joy of the Lord,” comes this wonderful, empowering refrain, “Yes Lord, Yes Lord, yes, yes Lord, Amen.”

What a great wake up call.

What was on your mind when you woke up this morning?

Is your pastor burning out?

yslamb — Wed, 04 Aug 2010 22:40:20 +0000

For anyone who cares about their pastor, this story is worth a read. For that matter, there may be something in it for you if you are one of those people who spend a lot of time and energy “doing the Lord’s work” and it is wearing you down.

This New York Times story about clergy burnout has been buzzing in some circles this week. Something is happening to our pastors that’s neither healthy nor holy, according to the article published Monday,

“Members of the clergy now suffer from obesity, hypertension and depression at rates higher than most Americans. In the last decade, their use of antidepressants has risen, while their life expectancy has fallen. Many would change jobs if they could.”

As parishioners, what are we doing to contribute to the decline in the health of our pastors? Are we depending on, calling on them more than we depend or call on God? Have we burdened them with the cares and concerns that we are suppose to leave on the altar?

According to my spin on this article, maybe too many of us have placed too much weight on the shoulders of our earthly spiritual shepherds and not enough on our heavenly Father who can carry all our issues and concerns and who doesn’t require a vacation.

Several studies have been done over the years with alarmingly similar results.

“We had a pastor in our study group who hadn’t taken a vacation in 18 years,” said Rae Jean Proeschold-Bell, an assistant professor of health research at Duke University who directs one of the studies. “These people tend to be driven by a sense of a duty to God to answer every call for help from anybody, and they are virtually called upon all the time, 24/7.”

Fortunately, some denominations and even pastors themselves are doing something to reverse this trend. The article reported that “as cell phones and social media expose the clergy to new dimensions of stress, and as health care costs soar, some of the country’s largest religious denominations have begun wellness campaigns that preach the virtues of getting away. It has been described by some health experts as a sort of slow-food movement for the clerical soul.”

What is your church doing to ensure that your pastor doesn’t suffer burnout or worse? What are you doing?

Young leaders blossom, inspire hope

yslamb — Tue, 03 Aug 2010 04:52:00 +0000

I used to be able to multitask pretty well, but last week I found it extremely difficult to accomplish much more than what was before me. And not just because I didn’t have Internet access most of the day. I kept feeling that I had to be present where I was and to hold only one thing at a time so that I could experience fully each day the hope that filled the room like a fresh bouquet of roses.

My days and most of my evenings were spent working with my siblings at or on the Earl T. Shinhoster Youth Leadership Institute in Savannah. Our months of planning paid off, and 21 middle school age students came to the Youth Institute at the Ralph Mark Gilbert Civil Rights Museum to learn about developing their leadership skills. They were introduced to leaders, past and present including our brother Earl, whose examples they could follow and were given a dose of African American history.

The students were engaged, eager and smart. Working with the 17 boys and four girls and getting to know them a little bit reminded me of the potential and the good that resides in our children. (Too often I read in the newspaper or see on televsion the negative things some of our young peopple are doing.) It was amazing to watch children who didn’t know us or each other move rather quickly from being strangers to becoming friends or at least friendly. They listened attentively to the speakers, even when the adults didn’t think they were listening. They asked and answered questions. They said they appreciated the time we spend with them, the encouragement we offered.

When it was time to complete a community service project, no one balked about cleaning out the tree wells around the museum. They pulled weeds, raked up old mulch, put in new mulch and swept up their areas. Even with a little playing around by some, it didn’t take long for them to complete their work. They seemed glad to do it and pleased with the results.

The students each created a list of community service projects that they want to do in their schools, churches and communities. They said they want to make a difference in the world, and I believe they will.

These 11 to 14 year olds already have a lot going for them — caring parents and other adult relatives, church involvement, school and sports participation, and good heads on their shoulders. I saw hope last week in the faces of 21 young girls and boys, and today I am praying for them and other young people like them who want to be, as Mahatma Gandhi said, “the change they want see in the world.”

“I have no greater joy than to hear that my children are walking in the truth.” 3 John 1:4.

Apology accepted

yslamb — Fri, 23 Jul 2010 22:23:50 +0000

There are just some things you ought not to apologize for, my friend insisted last week. If you know you are right and that God has told you to do a thing, then no matter how much folks protest or what they say, you just shouldn’t apologize, she fussed.

Given the context in which she was speaking, which I won’t bore you with here, she pushed a good point that I revisited several times since our somewhat one-sided conversation.

But when you are wrong, you just ought to say “I apologize” even though you know it’s probably not enough to heal the hurt you caused. An apology is better said than not in that case, I believe. We saw a glaring example of that this week during Shirley Sherrod’s rollercoaster ride in the media over an edited tape that tried to make the USDA official and a Georgia NAACP branch look like racists in action.

Without giving her a chance to explain, her job was yanked from her and she was vilified by some media pundits. Sherrod, who had spent her life battling unfairness and injustice, saw the twin evils visiting her again.

Sherrod was a study of grace under pressure as she grappled with the fallout from the doctored video. She got more public apologies in one week than she had received in her lifetime after the full video revealed the redemptive nature of her speech. From the country’s chief commander to one of the country’s biggest mouthpieces, Sherrod received a rush of mea culpas and an offer for a better job from her boss.

“I asked for Shirley’s forgiveness and she has been gracious enough to give it to me,” Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack said earlier this week. ”I did not think before I acted…This woman has been through hell.”

A sincere apology has healing powers. When we make amends, especially when we do it before hearts harden, we release God’s grace into our life and the life of the person we’ve offended. We create space for good to flow to us and to others, especially in situations like Sherrod’s when so many people felt the sting of her rebuke.

Author Margaret Lee Runbeck says it this way:

”Apology is a lovely perfume; it can transform the clumsiest moment into a gracious gift.”

When you have knowingly or unwittingly wrong someone in word or deed, do you quickly apologize or do you wait hoping time will erase the memory? Are you waiting for someone to tell you “I’m sorry” for something they did or said about you? Is someone waiting on you?

Today, decide to apologize or to forgive. Open up space in your life for God’s grace to flow through you.