I think her name was Gwen. She was a nice woman, with a strong robust voice, and a southern accent.
And at 10:00 yesterday morning I was yelling at her.
Well maybe yell is to strong a word (I guess that depends on who you ask). Let’s just say I was raising my voice at her because the gifts I ordered for my mom and nieces online for Christmas had still not arrived on my doorstep, as promised. Christmas by the way was on the 25th and it was now the 28th!
Now when I got on the phone my plan was to speak directly to the supervisor. But “Bless her heart Gwen” wouldn’t let me. She insisted I tell her the problem first. That automatically put me in a bad mood. I wanted to speak to a supervisor, I wanted answers, I wanted a refund of some kind, I wanted heads to rollllllllll. Clearly I was no longer being led by the spirit.
But even in my snippy tirade over retribution of some kind, the feeling that I was being mean to a lady I had never met in my life was starting to bother me. I did not know anything about her but she was starting to get some ideas about me. And I don’t think they were pretty.
John 13:35
“By this all men will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.”
I am not saying that because we are Christians we are perfect. We are not. We are going to mess up. We cant achieve perfection in these bodies but we can achieve the ability in Christ to open up our mouth and say sorry when we do blow it. I had already failed at the showing love part so I knew I was now in the area of somehow apologizing (Ephesians 4:31, 32). And I knew God was telling me I better do it before I got off the phone.
The other thought God was pressing on me was what if I ever met Gwen, like in real life. (That happened to me this year at a Christmas party. I ended up talking to a woman who had randomly helped me find a dress in a department store about a year ago). There I would be meeting Gwen, she might be in her Kohls t-shirt and I would be in my I love Jesus t-shirt. And I think she might be a little shocked to see that I knew Jesus at all.
And what about after this world. I often imagine what it might be like in heaven. I suppose since it is eternity we are going to have a lot of time. First we will meet God and spend time with Him (after we can pry ourselves away from Him), then we will see our loved ones and spend more time with them. Sooner or later we are going to get around to seeing who else is up there. I very well could bump into Gwen. We never know who we are speaking to in this world, when we encounter the postman, the store clerk, the pharmacist, the person on the the other side of the phone. The bible even says that the stranger we are encountering today could even be an angel (Hebrews 13:2)!
Apologizing to Gwen wasn’t easy. I was embarrassed and still feeling like I could justify my anger. I literally felt sweat coming off my forehead as I pushed out the words. But as soon as I did the anger left, and I crossed over to the good side once again and I was home. I told her I was sorry for getting so heated, and I knew it wasn’t her fault. She was silent but then finally said “It’s okay dear, I understand. And you know what, I really do hope your packages show up today. I hope they are sitting on your front porch as we speak.”
And with that we said goodbye and wished each other a good day. I was smiling once again and I think she was too.