Recently it really hit me that it is a wonderful thing to ask for forgiveness right away. If you do something that you need to be forgiven for, don’t delay. Do your part to apologize and rectify the situation as soon as you can. That way, you will not have that bad feeling hanging over your head.
I will admit I have been stressed about work lately because we are short one worker, meaning there is extra work to do, and I have vacation time to take. But, somehow I have to get all the work done with working less hours than I had been. There are also several items with certain deadlines to meet.
So, I was at work bright and early on a Monday morning when I got a phone call asking if I was going to take care of some paperwork. It was a day where my tasks were to be all doing one task, namely payroll. Anyway, I felt my blood pressure rising as I was talking with this lady. I could not stop the bad tone or the words that I regretted as soon as I said them.
As soon as I got off the phone, I sent the lady an email apologizing for my bad attitude and basically asking for forgiveness. It just felt like the right thing to do. Much to my surprise, she responded by saying, “No worries.” Her responding that way brought me relief. I did not want to strain our relationship and have to wonder if she was mad at me whenever we interacted.
Photo courtesy of Kerolic under Creative Commons License (CC BY-NC-SA/2.0)
Two days later, bright and early the phone rings again, and it is the same lady. So, I think right away, okay, have a good attitude. But, much to my surprise, when I answered, she jokingly says, “Is this grumpy?” It made us both laugh and start the day off right. To this day, it makes me smile when I think about it or when I talk with this lady.
And, it is a great reminder to make something “right” as soon as you can. It is a great relief to release it and be free once again.
“Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors.” –Matthew 6:11-12
