If you watch those cooking shows on the food channel, (I do) you have heard the announcer say, “two Minutes,” indicating that the time allotted for the competition has about run out. Once those words are said, the already hectic chef’s spend even more time looking at the clock fretting over how to wrap up the task at hand, and plate a truly amazing creation of food that maybe five percent of the people in America will ever get the opportunity to enjoy. It is exciting stuff and everyone feels better after the two minutes are spent, because they can breath again. The contestants always throw up their hands and exhale as the buzzer sounds indicating that time is up.
I was part of a timed event once. It wasn’t exciting. We didn’t exhale in unison when the clock ran out. We didn’t stand and cheer while giving chest bumps and high fives. No we just kinda stood up looking at one another waiting for someone to break the awkward silence. We didn’t even know that our event was being timed until the lady opened the door, and made the announcement that stunned a group of grown, independent, in charge alpha males. We were men at the top of our profession, serving as board members of a statewide trade association. We had all been elected by our peers, and had come together to conduct the business and make the decisions that would impact our industry at he state level for sure, and maybe even at the national level.
One of the first comments made when the meeting came to an end was by a man named Jerry. He was a funny kind of guy who always had us laughing, but this time I’m still not sure he was joking when he made his comment. As we all stood in silence and began to make our way to the door he said, “If my wife had said that she wouldn’t have seen me for three days…and then I’d a been a little blurry as her eyes began to open. Now we all knew Jerry, and we knew he wasn’t serious, but his comment did serve to lighten the atmosphere a little.
The reaction outside the meeting was almost the same as it had been inside the meeting. The announcement had been made with inflated lungs, and straining vocal cords, which allowed the ladies in the hallway to hear it too. The ladies sat stunned, and the children were told to calm down. You’d have thought someone had died, and in a sense at least a part of someone had died. Once we were in the car Paula told me that she had told the ladies, “If I’d done that Kent would have reached in his pocket for his keys, pitched them to me, and told me to hit the road, he would be home when he was ready.”
I understand the stress that the lady was under. We had all checked out of our hotel rooms. We were all heading home as soon as this last session was over, and I will admit that the meeting had lasted longer than anyone expected. I know she had her kids hanging on her shorts acting like undisciplined gerbils. I know every woman out there was just as ready to leave as she was, but…
The unexpected proclamation she had burst into the meeting to make was…”You’ve got three minutes to get this meeting over with, and get in the car, or I’m coming into this meeting, and you’re going to sit out here in the lobby with these screaming kids!”
I don’t think I have ever witnessed a more embarrassing moment in my life. I mean she put twenty men, and their wives in a situation that was very uncomfortable. And she had personally attacked her husband in front of his peers. She totally emasculated him, she defeated him, no, she cut his heart out for all intense and purposes.
What do you do? What do you say? Jerry had loosened things up a bit with joke about closing Gail’s eyes for three days, and after that people began to breath again. As far as the victim of this attack is concerned, it took him a couple of years to become active in the association again.
James 3 has a number of things to say about the tongue, and none of them are good. It says the tongue …”is a small part of the body, but it makes great boasts”vs5. It is a fire, a world of evil among the parts of the body. It corrupts the whole person, sets the whole course of his life on fire,…”vs6. “…no man can tame the tongue. It is a restless evil, full of deadly poison.”vs8 “With the tongue we praise our Lord and Father, and with it we curse men, who have been made in God’s likeness.”vs9
As I look back on that event I realize that the most damage I have ever done to anyone was caused by my tongue. I need the Lord to take control of my tongue.
My heart, my mind, my body, my soul
I give to You, take control.
I give my body a living sacrifice,
Lord, take control, take control. (Author unknown)
Till next time,
Grump