A Soft Answer
Continued from Blog Humility: Humble Pie or Tested Torte 1
In modern society humility is often confused with humiliation. They are distinctly different. People mistake the power of a humble response perceiving it as weakness. Peaceable responses to aggressive actions risk being seen as ineffective. To be powerful, violence or the threat of violence is the only way to get attention and get other’s to change their point of view.
But remember those who have stood in front of tanks.
“A soft answer turns away wrath.” Proverbs 15:1 (NKJV)
After twenty-seven years the image of Tiananmen Square’s Tank Man still persists.
Tank Man – Wikipedia: “Tank Man” temporarily stops the advance of a column of tanks on June 5, 1989, in Beijing. Published by The Associated Press, originally photographed by Jeff Widener, Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=239713
Violence is Entertaining
In our techno-driven age of big-box movies and serial television, high stakes drama is what captures attention and entertains. Look at the superhero trend – the good guys constantly battle it out with the bad guys (Batman, Superman, Spiderman, X-Men, Iron Man, Gotham…). Even the good guys use aggression to beat the powerful foes of darkness. Ego fights ego to regain or claim territory. Violence is entertaining. Certainly the make-believe battle scenes are riveting with their special effects…nothing like today in Aleppo, Syria. Carnage beyond comprehension: dust, rubble…death…hell on earth waits to greet the winner.
The aftermath of airstrikes in a rebel-held neighborhood of Aleppo, Syria, on Monday. Credit Karam Al-Masri/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images. https://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/19/world/middleeast/syria-russia-aleppo.html?_r=0
What Would Jesus Do?
Yet, Saint Theresa fought the powers of darkness by tending to the poor. But maybe in Kolkota, India it is easy to identify the poor.
The guy who approached me in the mall parking lot outside of The Bay and said he was hungry…well his clothes, although mismatched, seemed reasonably clean. With hands full of shopping bags I was still far from my vehicle. From the periphery of my vision I had seen him make a bee-line in my direction. He had clearly intended to cut me off and this made me nervous. Was he really hungry or did he want money to feed a habit?
I didn’t stop to think. I would have had to drop all my bags which oddly offered some protection if he chose to advance. I had blankets, pillows and sheets – not a great buffer but something to serve in my defence if needed. To drop my load and fumble in my purse for money would have left my hands pre-occupied and my person vulnerable. I hurriedly declined his request and skirted past him.
I have given money before to people in parking lots never knowing if I was responding to true need or being scammed – taking a chance that some part of the positive intention might reach the heart of the other, either angel or villain. But not this time – something in the man’s approach put me on guard.
Later, I wondered what Jesus would have done. What would Saint Teresa have done? If I’d responded with a soft answer than an abrupt brush off and offered to buy him lunch in the mall that may have evened out the exchange. More hospitable to sit down and eat, heart-to-heart. No territory to protect or defend.
To be continued (refer next post).
How would you have responded to the man in the parking lot?
I would have put my bags down and given him some money. I was approached at Walmart last Sunday when I took Linda there to get shoes. I gave the man money after putting my packages in the car. And he thanked me, said he was sorry he had to ask and that he was looking for work.