Come A Long Way

If ever you look at where you are, and wonder if you’ll ever get where you want to be, take heart: you’ve probably already come a long way. I mention that (surprise, surprise) because something took me by surprise this afternoon, letting me see that I have come a long way, indeed. I got a letter from an old acquaintance, apologizing for never having told me that I had hurt her terribly by doing such and so. Instead, she said, she’d built a wall. Because I merely skimmed through the letter, and then pitched it (burning it seemed a bit too dramatic) I don’t remember all the exact words, but the gist of the remainder was that I had done wrong things as a reaction to her having built that wall.

That’s all pretty yucky, and I must admit that I felt pretty yucky indeed for an hour or two after reading it. A supposed apology designed to tell you of errors that you committed five or more like fifteen years ago, blaming you for a prison you didn’t build, doesn’t particularly make you feel that you can run through a troop or leap over a wall. It was written for the express purpose of making me feel yucky, and it succeeded—for a little while.

Then I talked to the Lord a bit, and spent a few minutes talking through it with a good friend, and found that my primary emotion (PROGRESS!) was sadness. Primarily I was sad that this woman had allowed what could only be described as a trivial situation to inspire her to imprison herself in a dungeon of bitterness and resentment. I was sad that she couldn’t see that such trivial things could have hurt her so badly only if her emotional foundation was already seriously compromised. I was sad that she, already a “mature” Christian adult some years my senior, wasn’t able, at the time, to be honest with me about her likes, dislikes, and desires.

But the best is yet to come. After the first adrenalin rush was over, and I’d pretty well decided I wouldn’t write back with any of the sharp-edged words I can be very good at—in fact, I wouldn’t write back at all—I settled down and realized I should let her know I was saddened by her situation. So I did, and I meant it.

What I didn’t do, however, was take the blame for her situation, and that, folks, is progress in a major way. Sure, I can see that in my immaturity and emotional neediness I wasn’t as sensitive to her as I could have been. But I wasn’t at fault for not being a mind-reader, and I won’t accept the blame for walls I didn’t build or for the past that she still hasn’t dealt with.

I can stand apart and say I am genuinely sad that she chose to live inside a self-made prison all these years.

I have come a long way.

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