If You Are Going To Be That Way

We've had some remodeling done in our office. It's meant extra work for the facilities people. When the first round was done, we thought about doing something for them. It fell right with the holidays, so that noble idea got squeezed out.

Today they started doing a bit more. It's a short bit and they will finish tomorrow. A coworker and I decided late in the afternoon to revisit that idea. We looked at the department phone list and discovered that there are between 30-40 of them. We opted to go simple and surprise them tomorrow with brownies for the whole department since they serve us all year round.

As we were talking, she said that she could do brownies but not cookies. I was astounded to find out that she had only ever tried to make them once. She said that she had burned them and then, "If they are going to be that way . . . ."

I laughed. "So, the cookies burned themselves?"

She laughed too. But it got me thinking. How often do we write something off as someone else's issue and then abandon them altogether if they are going to be that way. A couple things seem perilous to me here.

• There is a lack of owning up to our own stuff.
• We abandon people (if it is their stuff or not) with a shrug and placing it all on them, "If they are going to be that way." Realistically, some of it may be their stuff, but in a throw away society, we are often to quick to even throw away people.

No, she wasn't serious. It was an off the cuff remark. But it did get me thinking. Where do I say, "If they are going to be that way . . ." and fail to take responsibility for my part or, at the very least, my part in my response to the interaction?

Somehow, I don't think Jesus ever got miffed and said, "If they are going to be that way." What if we stopped saying or thinking it? Would it transform our relationships?