February 9. Love is Not Rude

February 9. Love is Not Rude

The Greek word here is aschemoneo (ah skay moh neh’ oh) – to behave disgracefully.

How is it that rude behavior is seen by everyone else as disgraceful, but the person acting poorly rarely understands that what they are doing is so awful?

My mother insisted that we three kids learn good table manners.  Over and over and over, she worked on things such as chewing with our mouth closed, putting the napkin in our lap, not talking with our mouth full, keeping one hand in our lap while using a utensil with the other; the list goes on and on.  Anything other than proper behavior at the table was rude.

We also learned that, as children, we had the right to be heard, but interrupting while others were speaking or bursting into a room without good reason was rude and unacceptable.  In a pastor’s home, there were always people coming and going, and it did not matter whether they were the president of the local bank or a transient family in need of a meal; we were never rude.

She spent a lot of time with us helping us to understand the difference between good and bad behavior.  Rudeness was completely unacceptable in any situation.  It was disgraceful and in our family there was no worse punishment than hearing either Mom or Dad tell us they were disappointed in us.

When I was a senior in high school, by the second semester I was done.  As most of us did, we thought we were much too big for the high school any longer and senioritis was in full swing.  The last period of the day was phys-ed and I hated it.  I hated it.  So, a friend and I began leaving early.  We’d head to her house and listen to music or chat until school was out, then head back for whatever activities were on tap.

I must have been a complete idiot.  The high school principal sang in choir at church with us and mom was on the school board.  They were rather good friends.  He called her one afternoon to ask if everything was ok with me and of course, she was surprised by the call, but assured him she knew exactly where I was and would take care of the situation immediately.  My friend and I were upstairs at her house when the knock came on the front door.  I looked out the window and there was our car.  I couldn’t avoid the confrontation with mom, she’d caught me.

What is interesting, though, is how she handled it.  She didn’t ground me – I was involved in too many things at school and was necessary to their success.  She didn’t yell at me – that would have justified an argument between us.  She simply told me that I had been rude.  I had shown disrespect to my teacher, to the school and to my family.  The greatest punishment lay in front of me.  I had to go back into the school, apologize to the principal and to the teacher and plead with them to give me a second chance.

Rudeness wins no battles.  Respect and right behavior will always win. I learned a lesson that day that has stuck with me for 35 years.  I am never greater than anyone else and will never have the right to belittle anyone by my disrespectful actions. If I do so, I am responsible for setting things right.  If I love … I will not be rude, I will be respectful.  And since love is of more importance to me than anything else, rude behavior is unacceptable in any situation.