Suffering or Redemption?

Enemies. Would you rather watch them suffer or watch God redeem them?

“A new thought occurred to [Mrs. May]: suppose Mr. Greenleaf had aroused the bull chunking stones at him and the animal had turned on him and run him up against a tree and gored him? The irony of it deepened: O.T. and E.T. would then get a shyster lawyer and sue her. It would be the fitting end to her fifteen years with the Greenleafs. She thought of it almost with pleasure as if she had hit on the perfect ending for a story she was telling her friends.”

-Flannery O'Connor's "Greenleaf"

People with excessive self-pity and victim thinking expose the end of my grace and mercy. I know people who take this sort of pleasure in misery, and they drain every ounce of love and patience out of me. Before I understood that the bull in O’Connor’s “Greenleaf” was a Christ-type wooing Mrs. May, I was actually pleased when the it charged at her and gored her through the heart. The fact that I was disappointed at the notion that the bull may have been a form of salvation for her made me realize my sinful attitude: I had more satisfaction in the thought of her suffering than the thought of her redemption. I’m ashamed by my heart condition, but I’m glad that I am now aware of this weakness. I’m thankful that “He’s still workin’ on me” because there is a lot of work to do.