I hate traffic

So God has been on Pill and mine’s case about actively modeling a Christ like life and marriage, especially to our two boys. You would think that as a Christian that type of lifestyle would just come naturally, but we are as depraved and human as everyone else out there, so that lifestyle doesn’t exactly happen all the time, or sadly even most of the time. So what do you do when you really screw things up? Can God use times when you allow the raw sewage that still resides in your heart to spew out in venomous attacks to those you love most? Yes… yes He can.

Case in point … This morning we are driving into work, remember we all work and the kids attend school at the same place, so the commute is a family affair. There was a bit more traffic than usual today, and let’s just say that Pill and I have vastly different ideas of how much space should be available to be able to make a safe turn. When things didn’t go the way I thought they should, I shot him a look, he called me on it, he proceeded to do something that was in my opinion really stupid just to make a point, I called him on it, we proceeded into a screaming match ……right in front of our kids. Great Godly example of a marriage.

Let’s just say the next couple of hours went down like this…

• I stayed in the truck an extra 5 minutes to cry out my absolute rage.

• I went into work and do the best to plaster a smile on my face, but I’m a redhead and we don’t hide stuff well.

• 10 minutes later….I secretly hope that Pill slips on something in the lab and hurts himself bad enough to go to the hospital, but not bad enough to kill him or do permanent injury (sign of just how sick my mind is).

• 10 minutes 15 seconds later……. I pray that God does NOT allow the previous thought to happen.

• 15 minutes … Mike has to come into the office, I do my best not to make eye contact with him.

• 20 minutes later…….. I start worrying about how our kids are doing and if the youngest is going to Eeyore out on us and start spreading rumors that we are getting divorced.

• 60 minutes later…….. I hear a little voice telling me to pray blessings over Mike… I want to physically slap that voice.

• 65 minutes later…… I start praying blessings over Mike and begin to feel better (even though I still think he’s a complete jerk).

• 80 minutes later…….. I start to realize that even though I may be COMPLETELY right about Mike being a jerk, it was not a Godly example to my kids to scream at him in front of them.

• 120 minutes……. I get an email from Mike about something unrelated. I respond back normally. (BTW for you females… when you are in a fight with a guy and they say or email you ANYTHING that is not related to the fight… That is an assumed “I’m sorry.” If you respond back without being snarky that is an assumed “Me too, and you are forgiven.” )

So the rest of the day was uneventful. I worked out after work, Pill comes and picks me up, I go to the Chino and purchase some worm ridden lettuce, mangos, and pipas aguas.

We get home and I ask Pill if he will do me a favor, but that he should really wait to hear what I’m going to ask before he says yes. So I tell him that regardless of how “right” we both were this morning, we did not model a Godly marriage in front of the kids, and would he be willing to go with me to apologize to them? He readily agreed. We had a family meeting and confessed that even though marriage comes with disagreements (especially about driving and especially when you are driving in Panama) that we had not handled it in a Godly way. We admitted that we had both been disrespectful and unloving to each other, and that was not the example that we wanted to set for them. We also warned them that we are human and they will probably see this happen again with us, but we are work in progress. We then stopped and apologized to each other in front of the kids.

So it just goes to show that God CAN use your failures and short comings to His ultimate glory if you humble your heart and let Him. It’s just not always easy. Going to say some prayers… I’m sure there will be more traffic tomorrow!