Tuesday, June 30th

Philippians 2:14-16

Do everything without complaining or arguing, so that you may become blameless and pure, children of God without fault in a crooked and depraved generation, in which you shine like stars in the universe as you hold out the word of life – in order that I may boast on the day of Christ that I did not run or labor for nothing.

A long time ago – when our boys were quite young – Lorene and I had to go out somewhere so we had a babysitter come to take care of our boys while we were away. As I recall, just as she arrived, two of our boys got into some kind of conflict and we had to intervene so there would be no bloodshed before we left for the evening! It was actually a pretty small issue over a toy or something, so we quickly sat the boys down and got them to re-hash what had happened for us. When it became clear who had been the offended and who had been the offender, either my wife or I said something like, “Was that the right thing to do?” The boy who was guilty shook his head. We said, “What do you say?” And that particular boy turned and mumbled to his brother, “I’m sorry I took your toy.” To which his brother said quietly, “I forgive you.” And they both jumped up and ran off to play. As we turned back to the babysitter to assure her that the boys would behave – she said in amazement, “Wow! That would never happen in my house – no one ever says they are sorry!”

I share that little story not to claim that we always handle conflict perfectly in our family – we don’t! But I share it to show that something as simple as apology and forgiveness can have impact on others. Paul says,

Do everything without complaining or arguing, so that you may become blameless and pure, children of God without fault in a crooked and depraved generation, in which you shine like stars in the universe as you hold out the word of life –

If we look at these words from the context of “Faith @ Home” we see that we can have a powerful influence on the world around us simply by how we treat each other. Ask yourself this question: If my neighbors could observe my (our) home for a week – how we speak to each other, care about each other, treat each other, and how we forgive each other – would they be drawn closer to the God we say we serve – or pushed further away?

Ask God to make your home a “shining star in the universe”- and ask him to begin with you!

Brian Coffey