Difficult People

     In today's sermon, my pastor said, "being a spiritual person means a person who relates to difficult people".  He said, basically, if you are around people that you always agree with, you will not grow spiritually.  You need to be around people that are difficult in order to learn and receive grace in areas of patience, tolerance and acceptance.

     I often use to say, "man, these people better be thankful for my wife because if it weren't for her I would've killed a lot of them", or at the very least, told them what I really thought of them.  Dealing with my wife however, has been a trying experience in itself, but I tell you this, because of her, I have learned how to have extraordinary patience.  Relationships can be trying at times, but my wife seemed to intentionally make ours harder.  She would do some of the foulest things and bring me to a degree of anger that often precedes violence.  I use to tell her that if she was a man, doing the same things, that would have been his last breathe.  During those times, my coping skills weren't the greatest.  I would usually go to drugs and alcohol.  Matter of fact, I would crack a beer open after disputes with my wife and feel instant relief from the drama.  Needless to say, this behavior only fueled my addictions and ultimately worsened the situation.

     Thankfully, The Father is so wonderful, that He gave his Grace to me and brought me through these trials.  Because of His Grace, my marriage is stronger, my vices are controlled, my life is better, my family is happy and I'm good.  Had I been surrounded only by people that only agreed with me, I would never have reached a level of peace that comes with patience and tolerance.  I would still be operating in a superficial world, where everything revolved around me, and I could care less for others or what they were going through.  What a miserable existence.

     Now, when I'm around difficult people, and that's often, I'm able to deal with them easily, almost laughably.  I don't feel like choking the life out of them and for the most part, I don't notice them.  Just another example of the many blessings from The Lord!