Image by Rebekka D from Pixabay
Sometimes, when you are watching other people, you don't realize that others are watching you, watching others.
The Brown family had been deeply grieved by the trouble in the Stepforth family. Mr. Thomas Stepforth Sr. had been Bruno Brown's protege, and had overlooked his mentor's gentle hints: “You've made a ton of money, and you can make a ton more – son, you've got the gift for that! But, family is something you have to work a lot harder on.”
The Brown children had asked their father, up to the time of his death, why he didn't come down harder on his protege instead of letting him go through divorce and estrangement from his family. He had an answer they all remembered:
“Wisdom doesn't ever have to shout or force its way. That doesn't work on grown folks anyway. God has other means, and I just talk to Him. He'll fix it.”
Indeed – Mr. and Mrs. Stepforth were reconciling, and two of their five children had joined the reconciliation.
But still, the other three …
“What are we going to do?” Brunelle Brown Johnson asked her twin Bruno Brown Jr. “How do we help them see? They don't know what it is like to lose a father, but if they don't patch this up, they're going to be messed up!”
“Ain't our job, Brunelle – those are grown folks!” Bruno Brown Jr. answered. “But, see here … .”
Five minutes later, brother and sister came into the living room and began straightening up while they talked …
“Yeah, it's kind of like Easter is coming up in six weeks … it's a bigger deal than a funeral, but it's kind of the same thing … because the Lord rose from the dead, we know Dad will too, but if people really believed that Dad is going to rise, half the stupidity we saw today wouldn't have happened!”
“No, sis, surely wouldn't have. But see, this is what we do. We love our rituals. We love our eggs and bunnies. None of those rituals, eggs, and bunnies have the power to hold us accountable. The living Christ does, and the extent to which we believe He is risen is the extent to which we behave as people who have to give account to Him. Love one another. Forgive one another. Even why we are straightening up this room – 'Honor thy father and thy mother' has to do with the fact that we know what Dad taught us about Christ, and that Christ is here by His Spirit to help us do right and hold us accountable for doing wrong.”
“Yeah, Dad said we have to keep things presentable because anyone at any time might entertain angels unaware … we keep on honoring him because he is alive in Christ and so are we.”
“Right, sis, right.”
The Brown siblings had never looked over toward the windows in which the Stepforth sisters were standing, watching their parents continuing their reconciliation; they just did their work and left the room, because their father had taught them: “Wisdom doesn't ever have to shout or force its way.”
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