I have realized that some of the most gracious and affable people are those who have a practical construction of grace in their lives. Often times, it seems those least able to point to a verse or rattle off a quote are the most able to live it in their lives with gratefulness; that those most educated in the vocabulary of grace have the most difficult time in the practicality, the street smarts, of grace.
Grace is most definitely a religious word, but it's something I have more visible examples of outside of any church building. This is what I mean when I say gracious here: a disposition to act in kindness, pleasant, one who offers a reprieve, compassionate and forbearing. As of late I have been thinking more specifically of those who are gracious as an attribute of character.
I've been in the church or church settings quite literally all of my life. I was in the pew with the floral dress and white panty hose, I was in the Christian school's folding chairs in my plaid uniform skirt, and I am now sitting on a couch near the fireplace in my church. Always surrounded by church-raised Bible-educated friends, pastors, teachers, principals, and family members, I have been thoroughly immersed in a very knowledgeable part of God's family.
What's most surprising though is that those who taught and showed me what living grace meant weren't among the more spiritually educated.
I've been loved by some very gracious people, all very grateful people. They all seem to have this underlying understanding that, "you know what, I'm not perfect and you're not perfect and we're never going to be, so let's love each other and not waste time fooling ourselves." I doubt these gracious people could even articulate that to me, but their actions have said it to me.
True, often it seems the most gracious of people are those who have had the biggest issues in their own lives. They are easy to judge from that perspective, and yes, we are called to live the best lives we can, but they know how to keep score...and that you don't win by trying to be perfect. They are humbly screwed-up and genuine people, and they are grateful and easy to be around.
And then I see some people, who have read books on grace, memorized verses on grace, talk about grace in every conversation, but I see little of it in the workings of their lives. Though they of all people, trained and knowledgeable, should know that perfection isn't the goal they continue to strive for it to their despair. They could write me a dissertation on grace yet have the hardest time being gracious to others around them and I tend to feel judged, not loved, when in their presence. Their standard for themselves is unrealistic and that becomes imposed on those around them, which is to their disadvantage in relationships; they resent those who are realistic and gracious because people are attracted to them and it "isn't fair". They seem to play by an extra book of rules that they think is the standard, and are upset when others do not conform their legitimate freedom to it. Some of those who know most about grace are the least gracious of all.
Lately I have been reading a beautiful book by Henri Nouwen titled "The Return of the Prodigal Son", and he articulately compares the resentment of the ungracious and the gratitude of the gracious:
"Resentment and gratitude cannot coexist, since resentment blocks the perception and experience of life as a gift. My resentment tells me that I don't receive what I deserve. It always manifests itself in envy. Gratitude...claims the truth that all of life is a pure gift...Gratitude...involves a conscious choice...Acts of gratitude make one grateful because, step by step, they reveal that all is grace."
I know it's a blanket statement, I know there are some ungracious "sinners" and some gracious "Pharisees". But I understand the stories now why Jesus would eat dinner with the uneducated prostitutes and humble tax collectors rather than the Jewish teachers steeped in prestige and knowledge; these self-acknowledged imperfect people, they were genuine, they were grateful, they were gracious.
With my own history showing a susceptibility to resentment, I hope I am able to pull up a chair to many tables like that in my life to learn more about a gracious life.
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