Remember when half the country was snowed in a couple of weeks ago? I was one of them. I finally decided to get out one day when the streets weren’t too bad. They had been salted and plowed and people were moving freely about them; I knew the road wouldn’t be a problem.
The problem was my driveway. It’s long enough that it wraps around the back of my house, and I wasn’t sure my little car could navigate this small stretch of ice and snow. It turns out that it couldn’t. I got stuck just a few feet from the street. I tried turning the wheels back and forth while switching from Drive to Reverse to Drive while I jammed the accelerator, but it didn’t work. I tried getting irritated and yelling about it a little bit, but that didn’t work, either.
Finally a guy in a four wheel drive came along with an offer I couldn’t refuse: for $20 he would pull me out of the snow. I took the deal, and within a few minutes I was on the blacktop.
I drove straight to Home Depot and bought a snow shovel. Then I spent a good portion of the afternoon clearing a path for my car to get in and get out. I didn’t want to spend the month of February unable to get out of my driveway.
Resentments are like the ice and snow that keep us stranded, even as the rest of the world passes us by. We stay stuck, spinning our wheels, the path of progress just beyond our reach.
Here are a couple of things to remember. One, when you get bogged down with resentment, you might need a little help getting out of it. Two, if you don’t want to get stuck again and again, you need to do the hard work of clearing away the stuff that keeps you from moving forward.
Jesus said …
And whenever you stand praying, forgive, if you have anything against anyone, so that your Father also who is in heaven may forgive you your trespasses. (Mark 11:25)
Resentment is steeped in unforgiveness. It’s a refusal to let go. And more than your resentment will ever hurt anyone else, it will hurt you. It will keep you stuck, spinning your wheels, angry and irritable, while the world passes you by.
Is there a resentment you need to let go of today?
