Whoever can be trusted with very little
can also be trusted with much,
and whoever is dishonest with very little
will also be dishonest with much.
Luke 16:10
I thought of another old memory today. Eric and Molly were fairly young, and we went to a movie as a family. It was a rainy Friday afternoon and we thought it would be fun. As we waited in line to buy our tickets, the clerk at the counter was involved in a complicated change-making operation. People were handing money back and forth, and the whole scene was pretty confusing.
When the clerk was finally ready to help us, a lone twenty-dollar bill remained on the counter.
The clerk picked it up, looked at me, and said, "Now, this is yours, right?"
"No," I said. "I didn't give you any money yet."
She asked what movie we wanted to see. Handing us the tickets, she said, "Here, these are free. Thank you for being honest."
And the best thing about the episode was that Eric and Molly saw the whole thing! Not being one to miss an opportunity to preach, I made it clear to my children that it is always good to do the right thing - and that sometimes doing the right thing brings immediate reward. (I would have been happy to slip the clerk a twenty-dollar bill secretly. Surely the lesson was worth at least that!)
As I thought about that twenty-dollar bill, my mind went back to my own childhood. We were in Frankfort, Kentucky, leaving Jerry's restaurant. My dad saw a twenty-dollar bill on the floor next to the cash register. My sisters and I immediately began to dream about how we could use that twenty-dollar bill. (And twenty dollars was worth something back in those days!)
But Dad, much to our surprise, gave the money to the restaurant manager. "It wasn't ours," he explained to his incredulous children. "It belongs to somebody else."
I always thought that he had just given away twenty dollars. But I guess I got it back at the movies. And my kids got a pretty good lesson in honesty at the same time. Not a bad return on money that was never mine in the first place.
Sometimes we cut corners in little things because little things don't matter very much. But Jesus tells us that the little things reveal a lot. His followers are called to be tediously honest. That's the kind of honesty that the world will notice. That's the kind of honesty that reveals the true character of God.
By the way, I didn't miss the irony of our choice of movies that rainy day. We were going to see "Big Fat Liar." God has a wonderful sense of humor.
"No," I said. "I didn't give you any money yet."
She asked what movie we wanted to see. Handing us the tickets, she said, "Here, these are free. Thank you for being honest."
And the best thing about the episode was that Eric and Molly saw the whole thing! Not being one to miss an opportunity to preach, I made it clear to my children that it is always good to do the right thing - and that sometimes doing the right thing brings immediate reward. (I would have been happy to slip the clerk a twenty-dollar bill secretly. Surely the lesson was worth at least that!)
As I thought about that twenty-dollar bill, my mind went back to my own childhood. We were in Frankfort, Kentucky, leaving Jerry's restaurant. My dad saw a twenty-dollar bill on the floor next to the cash register. My sisters and I immediately began to dream about how we could use that twenty-dollar bill. (And twenty dollars was worth something back in those days!)
But Dad, much to our surprise, gave the money to the restaurant manager. "It wasn't ours," he explained to his incredulous children. "It belongs to somebody else."
I always thought that he had just given away twenty dollars. But I guess I got it back at the movies. And my kids got a pretty good lesson in honesty at the same time. Not a bad return on money that was never mine in the first place.
Sometimes we cut corners in little things because little things don't matter very much. But Jesus tells us that the little things reveal a lot. His followers are called to be tediously honest. That's the kind of honesty that the world will notice. That's the kind of honesty that reveals the true character of God.
By the way, I didn't miss the irony of our choice of movies that rainy day. We were going to see "Big Fat Liar." God has a wonderful sense of humor.