How do you respond to others in your life? How do you respond to your boss, your teacher, your parents, your siblings, your friends, or the stranger you just met? Who is responsible for how you respond? Who is ultimately accountable for your behavior or words, even if you don’t really want to admit it? Don’t we all want to blame somebody else for our response and claim they provoked it from us?
We see it every day in all types of situations, don’t we? We see people respond to someone in a negative or melodramatic or over-hyped or maybe even a dangerous way. We see people claim it was the other person’s fault for them responding the way they did. They claim they were taunted or goaded or were simply responding in kind.
Why is it that we see such lack of accountability for our own actions? It seems the only time we are willing to be held accountable is when we’ve done something good, something noteworthy. Too often, we want to hold someone else accountable for their wrong actions, yet not hold ourselves accountable for our wrong actions. However, when it comes right down to it, when we have to stand before the ultimate judge, we all will be held accountable for all of our wrong doings.
That sounds a bit scary to me. How many wrong things (or sins) have I done over the course of my life? How can I ever remember them all, let alone explain why I did or said them? Here’s the good news—Jesus came to cover those for us. He will stand there with those of us who have accepted Him as Lord and Savior to state all our wrong doings have been erased by His blood. That’s an awesome thought, isn’t it?! Yet it doesn’t give us license to continue in our bad behavior.
As a true follower of Christ, we are to emulate Him, to become a reflection of Him in all we do and say. That means giving up the thought of blaming someone else for our response, for our lack of accountability. We must hold ourselves accountable and pursue His pure holiness. We may never achieve it until the day we stand beside Him in heaven, but we must never stop pursuing it.
I pray each one of us will give up our bad behavior of blaming others for our wrong doings. I pray we all decide to pursue being more like Jesus every day. Wouldn’t the world be a better place if everyone held themselves accountable and pursued righteousness? Start making the world a better place by being a better you today. Pursue being like Jesus. Ask Him to help. He is faithful and will guide you along the path.
Colossians 4:5-6 Be wise in the way you act toward outsiders; make the most of every opportunity. Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone.
Marty Pressey 