A homiletics teacher once noted my tendency to go negative when I wanted to make a positive point. If I were illustrating some feature of humility, for example, I was more likely to tell a story about a proud person and say, "Don't be like that" than to extol a humble person and say, "Be like him." It was a smart observation. I don't think my teacher cured me of this tendency, but he made me aware of it just enough to encourage others to laud more than they scorn. (You can leave the scorning to me. I'm gifted at it.)
Gracious people laud. They tell you about the good deeds of others, and regale you with stories of kindnesses done to them. If they must tell you, "Here is how I was mistreated," they are quick to add, "But here is how I was helped." Grace-filled people notice grace in others, and open curtains to let light illumine acts of kindness that otherwise would not be known.
Years ago I heard a black preacher addressing a mostly white audience. He had grown up in the Jim Crow South. He talked about the time he was in the army and a white soldier friend asked him for a drink from his canteen. He handed him the canteen and the soldier took a sip straight from it. The preacher was nearly moved to tears. All his life he had had to drink from the "colored" water fountain - the whites he knew would not have drunk from the same cup that his lips had touched. But this white soldier treated him as a man, a peer, a brother.
It was not till later that it occurred to me that this preacher must have had thousands of stories of indignities and injustices he had suffered. But he didn't tell us any of those. Instead he remembered, related, and celebrated with us the kindness he had known. He was a man of uncommon grace.
I once tried to encourage a woman who was mildly estranged from her mother to reach out to her, to give her a call. But the woman replied, "When I call Mom, all she does is talk my ear off about people who have treated her badly." Later I had occasion to verify that that assessment was pretty accurate. The older woman could not seem to remember any good deed, only the bad ones where she was the victim. Good things done for her went unacknowledged and were quickly forgotten. Eventually I made a mental note: be like the old black preacher, not the bitter old lady.
If you would be a gracious person, then try to do this: where you see examples of goodness, relate them to others whenever you can do so appropriately. Instinctively gracious people - like my lovely wife - seem to be able to do this without even thinking about it. But natural-born oafs need to put effort into it, like the klutz who learns to dance by mechanically planting his feet on construction-paper cutouts on the floor. It may be awkward at first, but you'll get better at it.
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