Looking Past The Anger To See The Hurt

I have Praise Team rehearsals on Monday nights. I'm the leader and last night was one of those nights that I wanted to just come home and type up my resignation. I normally plan out the songs for the month, but for whatever reason I hadn't done the songs for March yet, including the songs for this Sabbath. So the beginning of the stresses was trying at the last minute to think of songs that don't require much rehearsal time.

One of the Praise Team Members gets to rehearsal and immediately she is confrontational. "Where is the musician? Why do we have rehearsal at 7 if we are not going to start until 7:15. We might as well start at 7:30, and on and on and on throughout the entire rehearsal.

By the end of the rehearsal my patience had thinned and so I decided to call her on my 30 minute drive home. God would have it that her husband would have her cell phone and I would have to wait until he made it home to speak with her.

About 15 minutes later she called me back. I begin by telling her that I'm not trying to be confrontational, I just need to get some things strait. At this point I am still very upset, but not looking to make matters worse, so I took a deep breath, said a quick prayer and went on to tell her how I felt about how the rehearsal had gone.

She apologized for being negative and unsupportive. I then asked her if she had any issues with me in particular that she wanted to discuss. She said no and went on to say that she was having a very bad day.

I asked her if it was anything that she wanted to talk about and she went on to tell me that today was the date that her Mother was murdered. She went on to say that February's are very hard for her and November's as well (her Mother's birthday).

I prayed with her before we got off the phone and let her know that she could call if she needed to talk.

I'm writing this post to say that often times we get so caught up in our own problems and issues, that we forget that other people have struggles as well. As Christians, we must take time to look past the obvious anger of others and be able to see the hurt that is buried deep within.

Those who hurt others do so because they are hurting inside. I could have very easily called her and given her a piece of my mind, and don't get me wrong, if she had answered the phone when I called, I probably would have. But what in the world would that have accomplished? Has God now been glorified? Has she seen Jesus in me?

In order to separate ourselves from the world and be Christians in the truest sense, we must show love to those who seem unlovable. We must have enough Christ in us to be able to see the hurt and love them in spite of the anger they so readily display.

For if ye love them which love you, what thank have ye? for sinners also love those that love them. Luke 6:32

Show love today to someone who is undeserving. It's what Christ does for us.