Today myself and my colleague went from Coventry to Nuneaton to collect and old cooker that had been kindly donated to the Jesus Centre. Prior to collecting it I had inadvertantly parked the car across someones drive. I had just been focussing on finding the address and so on, and simply failed to notice I was parked across a drive. We collected the cooker and when we came out with it (only a few minutes from when we had arrived) an angry young man, indeed the owner of the car shouted at us. It just so happened that the vehicle we were driving had the word "Jesus" quite prominent on the side. I did not hear exactly what the guy said but Jesus' name featured somewhere. I immediately said I was sorry and went to move the vehicle straight away. The young man said something else also which I did not fully catch, but one of the words he used began with "F" and I caught that loud and clear so I gues it was abuse. I said "I apologise" and went on to move the car. The young man and his partner drove off.
10/10 for the right response, why then did I feel so upset and angry afterwards? Why did I imagine various bad things happening to that couple today? As I thought about it I realised that actually the guy had slagged off Jesus so it could be counted as persecution for the sake of righteousness so I should be rejoicing. I don't find that easy in these situations. Having said that I hope that some conviction, or change will come about because of my turning the other cheek. If the commands of Jesus don't work for good then we are all in trouble.
