As a very young house wife, with three small children, I was appallingly annoyed when door to door sales persons would arrive and knock on my door.
To add to that, I was also watching a forth child for my friend who worked, and I did not take kindly to interruptions.
One eventful day, two young men knocked on my door, and I hesitantly opened it to find them smiling, and seemingly happy to see me. They offered to enroll me in a free Bible course, and suggested that I might also want to purchase a nice Bible for an excellent price.
In those days, I was still learning how to be polite, but on that particular day, I decided I had to get rid of these gentlemen quickly. Honestly, I must admit that I was rude, and I told them I was not interested, and not to come back anymore. I quickly shut the door.
“Good riddance,” I whispered to myself.
Within a few seconds, a gentle knock was again at my door. I reluctantly opened the door to find these same gentlemen still standing there. One of them asked me if I had a Bible in the house. I snapped at him, “Yes I certainly did.” He then asked me to do him a favor after I closed the door, and to go and read a certain scripture. I promised that I would do that.
He handed me a scripture reference, written on a small slip of paper, and said, “Thank you and good by.”
Shutting the door, I found my Bible and opened to:
Hebrews 13:2 Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for by this some have entertained angels without knowing it.
Guilt, embarrassment, shame, remorse, self condemnation flooded over my soul, like waves dashing on the rocks below.
I knew those men were not angels, or were they?
Regardless, of who they were, I had not treated them civilly. I had been discourteous and bad-mannered.
Like a slap of cold water to my face, this was a simple lesson learned, to treat others, even sales persons with respect.
I now live in the woods, so no one knocks on my door, but I receive many telephone calls wanting me to do a survey or purchase something.
This is what I tell them; “I want to thank you for calling and giving me the opportunity to do this, but I must decline. Thank you again, and have a nice day.”
If it works for me it will work for you, and it will save you condemnation over slamming down the receiver!!
This story was entered in "One Word at a Time" tag Condemnation. Please check out this lovely site: http://www.bridgetchumbley.com/
Zephaniah 3:17 reminds us that God is musical and He rejoices and sings over you. - - The LORD your God in the midst of you is mighty; he will save, he will rejoice over you with joy; he will quiet you with his love, he will rejoice over you with singing.
3 comments:
I always feel sorry for the sales person - cold calling people must be so disheartening. Perhaps I must tape your post to my phone to remind me of the human on the end of the phone struggling to provide for their family also!
Oh, this is a good story. What a great verse for them to hand out. I'll try to remember to be kinder to phone solicitors because of reading your post. I've been getting so many with the elections coming up and it gets tiresome, but nonetheless there is a real person (usually) on the other end of the line who still needs to be shown consideration, not condemnation.
Thanks for the thoughts!
It is hard to remember those annoying calls come from someone who is trying to earn an honest living.
I also don't like to deal with people trying to convince me that their beliefs are what I need to accept. When I stop to think about how strong their faith must be to go out and try to teach others... this can put me to shame!
Thanks for the reminder.
Post a Comment