I’d made it past the roundabout, a small miracle, and was just a minute from my destination, but up ahead, I could see a minivan stopped in the road. The car in front slowed, then stopped, and as I drew closer, I was irritated that I had to do the same. I assumed it would have moved off by the time I had approached, but after a few literal seconds of driving to a halt and seeing no reason for the delay, I pressed my horn.
And then, slowly, a pair of elderly folks appeared from the front of the stopped minivan. The gentleman was helping the woman with a walking aid across the road. Moving gently. Carefully. Tenderly.
My vision was impaired until it wasn’t.
The shame hit instantly. I was right by the bus stop with a handful of people waiting. I was mortified and didn’t dare look in their direction. I actually thought that if I didn’t look, maybe they would think someone else beeped their horn.
If I’d been the van, I of course would have waited patiently and even felt the tinge of doing something good. But I wasn’t in the van. I was the impatient driver who beeped.
Paul would call this the moment the “other law” wins a round, the reflex that leaps out before the heart has time to speak.
But even here, grace whispers:
You didn’t see.
Now you do.
Let this soften you, not crush you.
I’m reminded of a verse my nan would say: ‘slow to anger’, which then leads me to the other verse she says. ‘A still tongue keeps a wise head.’
I’ve been seeking a still tongue for years now.
I remember when she would say it, and I would continue with the altercation I was involved in anyway. Usually with my sister. Her saying it, and the verse, would go right over my head, but it’s there, ingrained, and now popping up.
It turns out the two sayings my nan always quoted weren’t both from the Bible after all. “Slow to anger” is straight from Scripture (Proverbs 14:29 (KJV)), but “A still tongue keeps a wise head” is an old English proverb that only sounds biblical, the closest match being Proverbs 17:28 (KJV) “Even a fool, when he holdeth his peace, is counted wise…” .
I think it’s interesting and slightly amusing that I carried both of them as Bible verses for years. (I was today years old when I learnt my nan may have been cheekily calling me a fool) Maybe that’s the point: her voice, her wisdom, her faith all blended together so seamlessly that I never separated them. Fifty per cent Scripture, fifty per cent proverb, one hundred per cent formation.
I pray that they start popping up faster than the words or reactions.
“Tomorrow’s reflection moves into quieter territory, a small, almost unremarkable moment that ends up saying more than I expected.”
The Eleven One 
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