Sunday, March 16, 2014

Proper Emphasis


I like to change.

Oh, not myself, certainly not. That would require too much effort.

No, what I do is glance around and tell myself how great the world would be if . . . someone . . .  changed.

You know who I mean. 

That guy at work who does everything except pull his weight. He brews the best coffee, and makes sure the water doesn't stagnate at the water fountain or cooler, bless him, but actually moving the paperwork and following up on the clients? Not so much. 

That girl who talks a little too loudly and thinks she knows everything. Some might confuse her with an intelligent, informed person, but we all know she really just wants to presume. 

The person who wants everything his way.

Yes. Those people need to change. Then the world - by which I mean MY world - would be the paradise I have always longed for it to be.

I read comforting verses from the Bible, too, making sure that SOMETHING MUST BE DONE! In someone else's heart. Because it says right there in Jeremiah 17.9, "The(ir) heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked. Who can know it? Besides me, I mean, because it is totally obvious."

I also go to Psalm 139 to let people know that examination needs to take place. 

SEARCH me, O God, and KNOW my HEART, 
TRY me, and KNOW my THOUGHTS,
SEE if there is ANY WICKED WAY in me,
And LEAD me in the WAY EVERLASTING.

Amen, and amen. 

Get busy, you people.

Wait a second. What if we changed to emphasis to the personal pronouns? 

What would that sound like?


Search  M E , O God, and know  M Y  heart,
Try  M E , and know  M Y  thoughts,
See if there is any wicked way in  M E,
And lead  M E  in the way everlasting.


Hmmm . . . the verse seems to lose its allure that way.

However . . . seeing it that way, and living it, makes all the difference in the only person I can change directly. 

Curiously, seeing it that way, and living it, also increases exponentially my influence on the people who might need to make a few adjustments in their own characters.

Always start with the person in the mirror. 





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