Being Available.

I had an "aha" moment yesterday. For several years now, I have been struggling with an irritation with people, complete strangers, thinking that I am approachable. I have people yell questions out their windows at me as I'm stopped at a stoplight. People are constantly coming up to me in the store to ask me questions. Simple questions, really, but nevertheless an interruption to my day. It has constantly annoyed me.

My post office has a ticket dispenser and the number you pull saves your spot in line. Just last week a guy came up to me in the post office and asked what number they were on. I pointed to the board that displayed the current number and he left me alone. Yesterday, again in the post office, a woman who spoke little to no English and wrote even less, got up from her bench, bypassed six other people and came straight to me and started pointing at things on a form she was filling out. I had no clue what she was trying to say, fortunately, one of the postal workers saw the problem and called her up to the desk. My reactions weren't so bad, but my attitude behind my reactions (which were hidden deep inside me) were nasty and irritable.

My heart muttered a prayer, "Why, Lord? Why did you make me so approachable? I don't like interruptions. I don't like people asking me questions." I was startled when a silent voice whispered in my mind "This is practice. Practice for something in the future. Remember kindness."

That answer scared me. What does He have in store for my future? But it also intrigued me. Because, again, what does He have in store?

1 Peter 4
⁹Offer hospitality to one another without grumbling. ¹⁰Each one should use whatever gift he has received to serve others, faithfully administering God's grace in its various forms. ¹¹If anyone speaks, he should do it as one speaking the very words of God. If anyone serves, he should do it with the strength God provides, so that in all things God may be praised through Jesus Christ. To him be the glory and the power for ever and ever. Amen.