Mere Moments

I pulled my car up to the green light setting the blinker on to make a left-hand turn. The intersection was crowded with cars all containing anxious souls in a hurry to get home after a long day.

At every angle surrounding my car was another driver attempting to make their own turn. A dear friend was in the passenger seat beside me and we both looked on as a young couple engaged in lively conversation gingerly made their way through the chalky white lines of the pedestrian walk. We watched and we waited… and waited some more. It appeared that the couple was completely unaware of the three different drivers who were all attempting to move forward but required to wait as they strolled through the intersection.

I was growing impatient with their saunter and made a quip expressing this emotion to my friend beside me. She laughed off my sarcasm. What felt like minutes was merely moments, and eventually I made the turn as the light flashed its bright yellow warning. And it occurred to me sometime later that perhaps through this random act of life, there was a lesson to be found. I was convicted by my expressed gracelessness towards the strolling couple that were in the middle of my path.

All within those mere moments I barrelled into all four barriers that inhibit us from abundant relationships through the giving and receiving of grace. I experienced fear of missing the light when I was growing tight on time. I felt guilt for my sarcastic quip because I held an expectation that these two strangers would understand the busyness around them. And I voiced my ill conceived quip aloud to my dear friend seeking affirmation for my poor reaction- not response– to a random hiccup of life. Who am I to demand two innocent people to move a little faster just so that I may not experience uncomfortable emotions that are just a part of every day life?

We must only look to the words of the apostle Paul in his letters to the Galatians to bring clarity to these barriers and why we come up against them. Paul struggled in his heart because the Galatians fell away so quickly from the gospel of grace he had preached to them. They had accepted the false teaching of others and sought to be justified in their actions by the Mosaic Law, but Paul’s argument was clear: justification comes to people by faith in Jesus Christ, not by their works under the Law.

Galatians 1:10, Do you think I am trying to make people accept me? No, God is the One I am trying to please. Am I trying to please people? If I still wanted to please people, I would not be a servant of Christ.

To be a servant of Christ, we must let go of our need to have others accept us. We deeply desire for others to be like-minded with our thoughts and opinions so that our choices are not only pleasing to others, but be pleasing to ourselves. We do this so that we may not have to experience the uncomfortable emotions that are a part of every day life. We do this so that we may avoid confrontation and awkward pauses in conversation. We do this to serve the minds and emotions of others, and ourselves. We do this to justify our sin. But this is not of Christ. If we do these things to serve our own minds and emotions, we would not be servants of Christ.

Later, Paul reiterated his message in a letter to the Thessalonians, the beloved people who were so poor in a worldly sense, but so very spiritually rich.

1 Thessalonians 2:4, But we speak the Good News because God tested us and trusted us to do it. When we speak, we are not trying to please people, but God, who tests our hearts.

Sometimes our hearts are tested, we gamble, and we lose. But count all these tests and trials as joy for they are the moments that teach us what true servanthood in Christ must resemble. They are the moments that teach us what real grace looks like. And sometimes they happen in the middle of an intersection.

Father, may we recognize the moments you are using to teach us; mould us into servants of Christ. Help us to let go of seeking the approval of others and by grace accept all those you put in our path. In Jesus name, Amen.

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