it was a complete mess!
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| La Dolce Vita, Carmel by the Sea |
While Lyndsey and I were in Carmel by the Sea, we ate at this amazing Restaurant called Le Dolce Vita. The salad was one of the best salads we ever ate, the thin-crust pizza was also very good, but our favorite was actually the dipping sauce they brought out for the bread. It was their own special recipe, and we had never tasted anything so great before.
In fact, we liked it so much that we bought a jar of it to take with us. Because I can have many bright-ideas at times, I decided to store this amazingly great-tasting sauce in the center console of our SUV. It was while we were traveling up to Portland, Oregon a couple of days later that we discovered the jar had cracked, and the sauce was all over the inside of our center console. Pastor James MacDonald, Jeremy Camp, Selah, Mercy Me, and many more Christian Artists were covered with this once great tasting sauce, but now messy and somewhat smelly nuisance. Well, of course, it was not actually Pastor James himself, or any of the musicians that we had stuffed down in our center console, but only their CD's. But the inside of our center-console was now a complete mess! The sauce had not only covered these and many other CD's but it had even leaked into the inside of our CD covers as well, and left about a half-inch pool of dipping sauce on the bottom of our center console.
To say the least, we were now faced with a full-on, unexpected, and incredibly stressful situation! Have you ever found yourself in the middle of one these situations before? Something unexpectedly disrupts your plans, and forces you to deal with it before moving on? This happens to all of us. I don't know about you, but for me, it seems to be much easier to handle when we are by ourselves, because there is no one else around for us to vent on. Wouldn't you agree? We can usually handle these things much better if we are by ourselves. Cause when we begin grumbling and complaining, nobody else is around to interrupt us, or push the wrong buttons.
So here Lyndsey and I were, in the middle of Oregon, stopped off at a gas-station of some small unmemorable town, and the peace and joy of our day and in our relationship, is now being threatened because of a broken-jar of dipping sauce that we purchased back in Carmel, California. We were both feeling the tension of the moment at first, and there was no doubt a battle of the flesh and Spirit going on within both of us (Galatians 5:17). It took an entire brand-new role of paper-towels, anti-bacterial swipes, and at least a half-hour of diligent teamwork to get everything cleaned-up, and for Lyndsey and I to get back on the road. Fortunately for us, we both maintained self-control throughout the entire process, and patiently and politely helped one another clean the entire mess up.
I want to also point out what a blessing my wife was. She could have told me to clean the whole thing up since it was really my mess. But she didn't. She was by my side helping me through this. I also want to point out that she never once asked me, "What in the world was I thinking?!" Which by the way, she had every right to ask. I knew I had blown it by putting that jar in there, but my sweet wife extended much grace to me, and I really appreciated it.
In fact, we liked it so much that we bought a jar of it to take with us. Because I can have many bright-ideas at times, I decided to store this amazingly great-tasting sauce in the center console of our SUV. It was while we were traveling up to Portland, Oregon a couple of days later that we discovered the jar had cracked, and the sauce was all over the inside of our center console. Pastor James MacDonald, Jeremy Camp, Selah, Mercy Me, and many more Christian Artists were covered with this once great tasting sauce, but now messy and somewhat smelly nuisance. Well, of course, it was not actually Pastor James himself, or any of the musicians that we had stuffed down in our center console, but only their CD's. But the inside of our center-console was now a complete mess! The sauce had not only covered these and many other CD's but it had even leaked into the inside of our CD covers as well, and left about a half-inch pool of dipping sauce on the bottom of our center console.
To say the least, we were now faced with a full-on, unexpected, and incredibly stressful situation! Have you ever found yourself in the middle of one these situations before? Something unexpectedly disrupts your plans, and forces you to deal with it before moving on? This happens to all of us. I don't know about you, but for me, it seems to be much easier to handle when we are by ourselves, because there is no one else around for us to vent on. Wouldn't you agree? We can usually handle these things much better if we are by ourselves. Cause when we begin grumbling and complaining, nobody else is around to interrupt us, or push the wrong buttons.
So here Lyndsey and I were, in the middle of Oregon, stopped off at a gas-station of some small unmemorable town, and the peace and joy of our day and in our relationship, is now being threatened because of a broken-jar of dipping sauce that we purchased back in Carmel, California. We were both feeling the tension of the moment at first, and there was no doubt a battle of the flesh and Spirit going on within both of us (Galatians 5:17). It took an entire brand-new role of paper-towels, anti-bacterial swipes, and at least a half-hour of diligent teamwork to get everything cleaned-up, and for Lyndsey and I to get back on the road. Fortunately for us, we both maintained self-control throughout the entire process, and patiently and politely helped one another clean the entire mess up.
I want to also point out what a blessing my wife was. She could have told me to clean the whole thing up since it was really my mess. But she didn't. She was by my side helping me through this. I also want to point out that she never once asked me, "What in the world was I thinking?!" Which by the way, she had every right to ask. I knew I had blown it by putting that jar in there, but my sweet wife extended much grace to me, and I really appreciated it.
The point to this story is that even people who love Jesus and serve God, find that life can sometimes be extremely messy. But even on the most stressfully-messy days, the benefits of loving Jesus, and spending time with Him (especially first thing in the morning as we had done) helps prepare us, and protect us from lashing out at each other or at others, when highly stressful and messy situations like this sneak up on us?
May the Lord give you the strength to overcome stress, the next time you find yourself in the middle of a terrific mess!
"But also for this very reason, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue, to virtue knowledge, to knowledge self-control, to self-control perseverance, to perseverance godliness, to godliness brotherly kindness, and to brotherly kindness love. For if these things are yours and abound, you will be neither barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ." (2 Peter 1:5-8)
