~~PAY IT FORWARD~~

Easter may be "over", but the goodness of Easter should never be over. We always talk about trying to keep the Christmas spirit all year long, yet the Easter spirit is so much more important. There is no exchanging of gifts and harried and hurried wrapping, but there is the most awesome one Gift that we received but need to pass on to others. I'm going to try to really work on those random acts of kindness and those things I can do for others and not have them know about it. The best gift is keeping the Easter Gift giving through our own hands!! St. Teresa of Avila said it so well: " Christ has no hands now but yours..." He is in Heaven now and we need to be kind, loving and giving persons, His hands now!

Let's help make life good for others, especially that really crabby person or the one who cuts us off in traffic or pushes ahead of us at a store. Trust me, this is a challenge for me too because I've thought things like "Gosh that person would look good in duct tape...or where are ear plugs when you need them? ...or where are the elephant tranquilizer darts for emergencies like this (these could also be handy dandy when husbands or children aren't behaving)?"

Examples always work so well, so here goes one...

Years ago I worked in a wonderful bank where we were blessed with so many pleasant customers. BUT one day a very tall muscular man, a very angry man about 35 yrs. old, came up to my window and looked down at 5'3" me and snarled, saying "Your bank made a BIG mistake with MY account and YOU are gonna fix it. I don't want you to call anyone or bring over a bank manger. I want YOU to FIX it!!!" Of course, at this point I had tons of options, but I had Someone much bigger with me, the Holy Spirit, and I felt no intimidation and no fear as I calmly said "Sure, let's see what we can do for you." That shocked him as he was looking for a fight. Slowly, patiently and carefully, I checked with him as we went through the transactions he had in his checkbook versus the actual transactions on my computer screen. Naturally we found debit card transactions as well as a few checks not entered, but I never made it sound as if he or his wife were "guilty". Rather it was more of an innocent, surprised tone "Really, are you sure it's not there and do you remember this?" It took maybe 30 to 45 minutes but we sorted through it all and he left much calmer and very quietly. After that I just thanked God for the peace and guidance and thought no more of it. The next day he made a special trip to the bank to thank me and to apologize. See what God can do if we let HIM???

Somewhere I have a printed version of that prayer so loved by Mother Teresa about doing good and being kind even when others are so unkind. I'm going to tape it up here (maybe even move it around to keep us on our toes) where we can all look at it.

~~Thank you , Lord for all the opportunities out there for us to be kind to the unkind.