Seventh-day Adventist® Church

RSVP
Répondez s'il vous plaît, a French phrase inviting a response. Sometimes we are asked to give our response, but sometime we give it anyway. Either way, our response can encourage, offend, persuade, and dissuade someone in their actions. Our influence on someone should not be disregarded.

I read today to two boys, each working as an altar boy, in different towns, but similar era. One boy accidentally dropped a goblet and spilt consecrated wine all over the floor. The priest struck the boy, shouting at him that he should not come back. The boy obliged. 

The second boy accidentally did the same thing. A different church, a different priest. This time the priest winked, and whispered, "You are going to be a priest someday."

The first boy, Marshall Tito (Josip Broz), became the authoritarian dictator of the former Yugoslavia. The second boy, Fulton J. Sheen, became a TV priest in the USA. The assertion in the article I read is that it was the alter boy experiences that determined the polar opposite lives these boys developed. 

I am not sure about the details or the implication of the article, but I repeat the story because I am pondering about the affect we have on others. 

Proverbs 22:6 (NIV)
Start children off on the way they should go,
and even when they are old they will not turn from it.

OR

Proverbs 22:6 (MSG)
Point your kids in the right direction—
when they're old they won't be lost. 

Two comments. Two priests. Two boys. Two different careers. 

After Peter denied Jesus, three times, Jesus effectively winked at Peter and said, "You are going to be priest, a faith leader, someday."

I like it that Jesus did not tell Peter to clear off. It gives me hope. When I find myself stepping back from the presence of God, He doesn't keep his distance, but offers words of support. 

God wants to direct us, without pushing us away. And we get that instruction when we are in the presence of God. And after all His expressions of love to us, He asks us to RSVP. 

-Pr Nathan Stickland