I could never.

Be careful of the thought, "I could never..."

This morning I was thinking about someone in my life about whom I usually think, "I could never..." This person, a woman, destroyed the marriage of another woman. I could never. Let me elaborate. This woman had an intimate relationship with a man that she knew was married. She pursued this man methodically and intentionally until his marriage finally ended. Until a wife and children were left to pick up the pieces and find a new life to replace what they used to have. I could never. Then this woman married the man and together they started a family. I could never.

Oh I could certainly never...

And, uh, well; I still think I could never. I know I know I shouldn't think I am incapable of anything without Jesus but I am not without Jesus and so I could never. But there is more to it. There is the initial thing. Let's call it what it is, it is sin. There is the sin we allow ourselves in a moment of weakness or in a life of lostness. But there is something worse than the moment. There are the lies we tell ourselves that change more than a moment in time. They change who we are. And those lies, I could...

I will be honest with you and tell you, that woman? I don't like her. And it's not just what she did to a family that causes me to not like her. I don't like who she is now. That's what I was convicted of this morning, not liking her. Can you imagine? I get convicted of not liking someone who did that? I wonder suddenly how much that first moment of sin changed who she is now, years later. All of the things she had to become to try and keep control over the events she set in motion. Who might she have been otherwise?

It makes me wonder about her now. I don't like her. But maybe I would have liked who she was before or who she could have become if her life hadn't been defined by trying to hold her home together without a foundation. Fear makes people desperate and I think she has lived day after day in fear. I haven't got a new outlook. I just have this thought that I want to tell her that I understand why she behaves as she does. And I bet her life has been pretty difficult. And that she started this run-away train. And it's not too late.

It isn't too late to be brave enough to fall face forward into vulnerability and trust that God's love really is enough to catch her. Of course, if she is going to be that kind of brave, I have to prove her trust in God to be right by accepting her. Learning to love her. Giving her another chance to be the person she almost erased when she did what I could never...

The thing is, when it comes down to being her friend, I am a little worried that I could never...

I've got some praying to do.