Good Morning Everyone,
Our theme for this month: “Wisdom from Proverbs”
Our Bible verse for today: “If your enemy is hungry, give him food to eat, and if he is thirsty, give him water to drink; for you will heap coals on his head, and the Lord will reward you.” Proverbs 25:21-22 (HCSB)
Our thought for today: “Shame them with kindness.”
One of my favorite novels of all time is “Les Miserables” by Victor Hugo. The story takes place in France in the early 1800s. It’s the story of Jean Valjean, a man who spent nineteen years in prison for stealing a loaf of bread to feed his sister’s hungry family. Once he is finally released from prison he wanders from town to town trying to find a place to stay, but because he is a convict nobody will even allow him a bed in an inn.
Finally a kind priest invites Jean to spend the night in his home. But in the middle of the night Jean, now a hardened criminal, gets up and steals the priest’s silver. He then flees, only to be captured by the police and brought back to the priest’s house silver in hand. But when they arrive at the priest’s home the police are flabbergasted when he proclaims that Jean did not steal the silver. Rather, the priest claims, he gave it to Jean as a gift. The police, not believing the priest but having no other choice, release Jean Valjean and depart the scene.
Standing there in the presence of the priest Valjean is dumbfounded and doesn’t know what to say. The priest gently tells him to take the silver, use it to begin a new life, and then to become a good man. The rest of the novel is all about Valjean’s lifelong effort to do exactly that – to live a good life and to be a good man, worthy of the kindness and charity the priest extended to him.
The impact the priest had on Jean Valjean is exactly what Solomon describes in Proverbs 25:21-22. The best way to respond to those who wrong us is with grace and kindness. Often that will shame them into better behavior.
However, we also need to understand that this Proverb is just a general principle that is simply intended to be a rule of thumb. It is not an ironclad rule that applies all the time and to all situations. Most of the time this is a good initial approach but sometimes it would be clearly inappropriate, such as when a person is in the process of committing a violent act. At a time like that you wouldn’t want to shame him with kindness you would want to stop him with force.
At other times you may find that your initial attempts to be patient and kind in the face of mistreatment and meanness only results in more of the same bad treatment of you from them. In that case you are enabling bad behavior and perhaps even allowing them to go on taking advantage of you. Therefore at some point your patience and kindness will need to evolve into a more forceful response.
God is pleased when we use patience and kindness to help others see the error of their ways. Sometimes shaming them in that way will end up helping them to see the error of their ways and to change their behavior.
But not always. Shaming them with kindness is a good first strategy. It could be that a second and third try is called for as well. But we also need to know when enough is enough and a different, tougher approach is called for.
God Bless,
Pastor Jim
Oak Hill Baptist Church 