CREEDE HINSHAW: ‘Kindness’ reminder comes from roaring lawn mower

Sunday morning. 9 o’clock a.m. My front porch. This is one of my favorite times of the week. I have a cup of coffee and my devotional literature beside me. On this day alone I add frothed milk to my coffee.

The rocking chair is comfortable; the air is cool and contemplative classical music is playing. Later in the morning, I’ll drive to worship service, eager to be with others in the worship of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

But first comes the calm gift of a glorious June morning.

At least it was calm until my neighbor fired up a lawn mower. I am incensed. How could he do this? He destroyed the sacred silence of this hallowed day, breaking the commandment to do no labor on the Sabbath as well. I harbor thoughts not worthy of a clergyperson.

But at the precise moment he fires up that infernal machine, I have opened my morning reading from Lawrence Losavik’s incisive book “The Hidden Power of Kindness.” I am reading through this 1962 book with a group of men who meet weekly. I have been calling the men in my group “The Kindness Fraternity,” and I believe (or hope) the book is subtly shaping my life for the good.

Back to the book and the mysterious movement of the Holy Spirit. The very sentence I am reading as the mower begins its annoying wailing is this: “When you are tempted to judge the guilt of somebody else, the best remedy is the practice of thinking of your own guilt and demerits before God.” (p. 53)

These words followed from the same chapter: “Your neighbor, for all his defects, may be far more pleasing to God than you are.” (p. 56.)

Ouch. Bullseye.

I’d like to say that my irritation evaporated immediately, but that would be exaggerating to portray myself as saintlier than I’ll ever be. However, I was immediately chastened.

Who was I to judge my neighbor? Who was I to assume I was spiritually superior to him? How do I know what is going on in his life? How do I know whether he had been to worship earlier in the day? Why would it make me superior to him whether he went to church at all? Why would I think I had any more right to my understanding of Sunday morning than he?

The person in need of deeper understanding and compassion was not pushing a lawnmower. The person in need was sitting in the rocking chair, fuming about something over which he had no control. The person pushing a lawnmower needs God’s presence, too, but the person sitting on the front porch was clearly the one in need of forgiveness for his sinful pride and superiority.

Kindness takes many forms and is practiced in many ways. My Sabbath porch time reminded me that one aspect of kindness is refraining from self-righteous judgment.

The righteous love of God was imparted not via the calm silence, but through a noisy gasoline engine.