Giving grace

 

Last weekend, a friend came out to lunch with me at the local McDonald’s restaurant.

We had a lovely, long, leisurely lunch. Such a good time! I dropped her back home and drove to my own home for a relaxing afternoon.

Two days later I received a parking infringement for McDonald’s. Apparently their parking lot now has a sixty minute limit! So for the half hour that I was over the limit, I was being fined eighty five dollars. That seemed extremely high. Our city council only charges forty dollars for parking infringements.

I visited the parking area, and sure enough I saw the signs. They definitely hadn’t been there on prior visits and as I hadn’t expected to see them, obviously my brain simply hadn’t registered them. I spoke to the manager who looked about twelve years old! He was very nice, explaining that the time limit was fairly new before giving me the phone number of the McDonald’s person who was in charge of parking. He too was very nice and suggested I ring the company who is contracted to manage the parking infringements. He did say, that it doesn’t matter how much over the sixty minutes you are, whether it is five minutes or two and a half hours, the eighty five dollars is a flat fee. So I emailed the appropriate submission form to the contracting company who came back to me wanting a copy of my receipt or a screenshot of my banking transaction. I threw out the receipt because who keeps their McDonald’s receipt once they have eaten their meal? And I paid by cash so can’t provide a shot of the transaction. We will see what happens.

I was thinking about the fact that actually what I was asking for, was ‘grace’. Justice would say I parked over the limit so have to pay. Grace would say that it was a first time offence and she hadn’t seen the signs so maybe we let her off this time.

I have a very strong sense of justice and this plays out in my life in many ways. I try to have grace but know it is something I have to continually think about and work on. God is a just God. Justice would say that because we are all sinners, we should suffer the consequences—eternal separation from God. But God also has grace and sent Jesus to take the punishment for our sin. So justice is served and we are saved. He gives me so very much grace, I really want to do the same for others. How can I not?

‘Where sin abounds, grace abounds much more’ (Romans 5:20). My prayer is that recognizing God’s abundant grace for us, we will give grace to others. God bless.