Have you ever meant to help someone out before and yet
caused their situation to be worse?
Maybe someone uttered the phrase, “Hey, just stop, you are doing more
harm than good here”, recently to you.
If so, you know how embarrassing it can be to intend to do someone good,
but in return, make their situation even harder on them than before.
Picture this scene I witnessed a few years ago that is a
perfect example of this. I was standing
in a Burger King parking lot talking with some friends alongside of a busy five
lane highway. This Burger King was
located about a tenth of a mile north of a busy intersection. If one wanted to pull out of the restaurant
and head north on the highway, they would have had to dart across three lanes
of traffic in order to do so. Most
people would head to the light to safely make it out. But on this particular day, one young lady in
her blue Corolla, took the chance that most wouldn’t. She pulled up to the highway with her left
blinker on, frantically looking both ways, hoping to find her break in traffic
in order to cross the three heavily traveled south bound lanes in order to head
north. After sitting there for about 20
seconds, the light to her south turned red and the lane closest to her backed
up. But one gentleman in this lane chose
to be kind and allowed space for the young lady to pull out. As I watched this unfold before my eyes, I
knew this wasn’t going to turn out well.
The man in the car was clearly enamored at this young lady’s looks as he
gazed at her while not considering the traffic around him. In his kindness, without checking the second
or third lane next to him, he smiled at the blonde hair woman and waved her
out. The woman could not see beyond this
man’s car and therefore was taking the man’s word that he had checked traffic
for her (which I could see from my view point that he didn’t) and all was clear
for her to pull out. I think you can
imagine what happened next. This young
lady, by the helpful hand of this gentleman, in a desperate move to make it
safely across these lanes, blindly floored it.
The chirp of her tires slipping as her engines revved up, told those
around that she was reacting to this man’s gesture and did not feel completely
safe about entering into traffic yet. The tragedy of the scene (which definitely
made me chuckle for a second) was that she floored it straight into oncoming
traffic as she was t-boned by a car doing about 45 mph in the lane next to this
man who waved her out.
Out of sheer embarrassment, the guilty man ducked his head
and took off, leaving this young lady with a wreck to clean up.
What an example of doing more harm than good.
Have you ever given thought to this concept and how it plays
out in your Christian liberty? You have
learned, over the years, that God has set you free from the law and that in his
grace you are free to enjoy a relationship with God that includes enjoying
certain pleasures in this world. Yet,
while enjoying those pleasures, you may be doing harm to your brother or sister. In fact, you may even encourage your brother
or sister in Christ to loosen up a bit and walk more in grace than in law. Yet, in your efforts to lead them in the
knowledge that you have of the gospel, you may end up doing more harm than
good. Take a look at how this plays to
in 1 Corinthians 8:10-13,
“For if anyone sees you who have knowledge eating in an
idol’s temple, will he not be encouraged, if his conscience is weak, to eat
food offered to idols? 11 And
so by your knowledge this weak person is destroyed, the brother for whom Christ
died. 12 Thus,
sinning against your brothers and wounding their conscience when it is weak,
you sin against Christ. 13 Therefore,
if food makes my brother stumble, I will never eat meat, lest I make my brother
stumble.”
This individual, who was eating food in an idol’s temple,
was waving his weaker brother out into oncoming traffic. He did not realize that his brother who was
witnessing him eating in an idol’s temple (which Paul indicates that this act
of eating in an idol’s temple, in and of itself is not wrong) was being led
astray and this was causing more harm than good for him. Paul,
at the end of this section, makes a startling commitment to become a vegetarian
if that’s what it takes to ensure he never leads his brother astray.
Are you willing to say “never” to the things you enjoy for
the sake of loving your brother or sister?
God is not as concerned about strengthening those who struggle in their
faith, as he is with those who are more mature in their faith stooping down to
the level of their brothers and sisters who are struggling.
This is the example Christ gave us, by stooping down to our
level, and dying for us. We should be
more concerned about what actions we may do that would stir doubt inside of a
fellow Christian’s heart, than indulging temporarily in our Christian freedom. For example, drinking alcohol in the presence
of some may destroy their faith instead of build them up. Or, the kind gesture of paying for a friend
to see a PG-13 movie, and yet this friend is condemned in his conscience while
he watches it.
Our ambition should be to know our Christian family so well
that their weakness becomes ours. This
makes knowing how to handle yourself in their presence much easier.
But hat’s off to you for having a heart of kindness to begin
with. Just like that man who kindly
waved the young lady out into traffic; who gave up a moment of his day and a
portion of the road that belonged to him to show kindness to his neighbor, you
genuinely want to love and care for others.
I guess it would behoove us to look over our shoulder and see if there
is oncoming traffic that may take us or our beneficiary by surprise and
possibly destroy them.
