Benefit of the Doubt

Last week I dealt with a nasty cold, so I was pretty much housebound for 4 days. I´m pretty well back to 100% now, just shaking off the last hangings on of a cough.

That said, last week I had ample time to blog surf. During my surfing, I ran across a blog... I honestly don´t remember which one or where now, but the topic has stayed with me. The post was about practicing the "benefit of the doubt" ideology in relationships. I think that´s pretty self explanatory, but in case it´s not, it simply states that when you feel wronged, instead of jumping to conclusions ("it´s a JUMP to conclusions mat..." haha, gold star for the reference), you start with the assumption that no malice was intended. Of course upon further inspection and questioning of the person you may come to find that indeed malice was intended, but it is dangerous to start from that perspective.

I think this is especially important when dealing with cross-cultural relationships. At times when I´m with my friends here they will do something or say something and I think to myself, "What the heck is wrong with you?" Haha... I´m sure I´ve inspired the same thoughts in many people here. :) But I have been trying very hard, upon feeling wronged, to step back from the situation and my emotions and give my friends-- who have demonstrated time and again how much they love me-- the benefit of the doubt. Those momentary flashes of anger that happen to us all when we feel violated are just those-- momentary flashes, and need to be treated as such. That´s why it´s so important not to act out of those feelings of frustration and hurt.

Yes, benefit of the doubt. Good plan indeed. A demonstration of grace, I think.

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This is Jonathan, Guto, Paul, and Ivan. Friday night I had the distinct privledge of hanging out with them all night and into the wee hours of the morning. I got to sit in on a very intersting conversation between these guys about the church in Brazil, where they feel it´s going and where they would like it to go. It was a real honor because I know these guys are the future leaders of the church in Brazil, and it gave me great joy and hope to hear their thoughts. But before we got to all that deep, touching stuff I did sit through my share of fart jokes and other bodily functions. Let me just say for the record that I´m pretty sure boys are boys no matter where in the world they are. :)

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Has anyone else in the world ever secretly wondered if their email was broken because you never seem to get stuff? Yeah...

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More to say, this is actually going to be quite a big week for me! But I´ll save it for another blog. I pride myself on my prolificness (is that a word?), don´t ya know... ;)