“You often say, ‘I would give, but only to the deserving.’
The trees in your orchard say not so, nor the flocks in your pasture.
They give that they may live, for to withhold is to perish.”
— Kahlil Gibran, The Prophet, p. 34
Grace. Human, kind.
There’s a funny story about my impatience and a very old driver below. But first, let’s talk about Grace.
It’s rather difficult to talk about Grace as a thing—a tool—particularly since there’s nothing transactional about it. You can’t earn Grace and you can’t become undeserving of it. Grace is what we exhibit when we choose to give others (or ourselves) the benefit of the doubt. It’s the antithesis of mean-spiritedness. The opposite of quid pro quo.
And in that way, it’s like a Bird Feeder.
You don’t fill the bird feeder because you want something from the birds. You don’t fill it because you plan to lure in the sparrows and cook them for dinner.
There are no negatives here, just positives: you put out the bird feeder because you wish them well.
Among human beings, we fill and hang the Bird Feeder of Grace all the time. I’m certain there are plenty of times when you’re kind to people, even when they haven’t “deserved” it—simply because, well, it’s fairly delightful to be gracious when we can be. I’m glad that Grace keeps on happening. Here’s the how and why of making it happen a little (or a lot) more.
Let’s say you’ve asked your spouse, teenager, or roommate to cook dinner and you come home from work and… nothing. It would be natural to throw up your hands in disgust and say, “You didn’t cook dinner? You’re so inconsiderate. What, you want me to do all the work around here?” Or maybe not say it out loud, but think it—and let the resentment fester and fester and fester.
It’s natural to feel hurt, let down, overworked, and under-appreciated. Not to mention hungry. And sometimes it is reasonable to tell someone they’re being inconsiderate.
Grace doesn’t mean letting anyone walk all over you. So sure, get mad if you need to. Stick up for yourself. If you’ve asked them to pull their weight with cooking several times and they keep not cooking, it might be perfectly reasonable to throw your hands up, stomp around, maybe even angrily wave a spatula and say, “From now on, buster, you can just starve!”
However, before unleashing your inner Daffy Duck, you might want to perch on the Bird Feeder of Grace for a second.
Since we always want to look both ways before driving through the stop signs of life, it can’t hurt to acknowledge the lack of supper and feed a bit of gracious curiosity into the situation. We can always get mad later.
First, ask something like, “Hey, did something set you back? I thought you were on dinner tonight?”
Sure, if you’re me, you’ll probably answer with, “I forgot until about five minutes ago—I just took the chicken out of the freezer.” Or, “Sorry. I don’t feel like properly cooking. Can I make grilled cheese and soup for us?”
But it’s also possible your spouse, roommate, or teenager has a valid reason—maybe the water heater broke and the basement’s a lake, or something went wrong with a family member and they were helping out. The long and short of it is: we strive to lead with Grace not just because the situation may need it, but because if you charge in waving your spatula, well, now you’re being inconsiderate.
Besides, being curious and gracious sits a lot better than indignant rage. Hard to believe, because indignant rage hits so good (for about a second), but it’s true: dipping into the Bird Feeder of Grace feels even better.
I was behind a Ford Fiesta at a red light yesterday. The light turned green. And still, that Ford Fiesta was more of a Ford Siesta. He wasn’t moving. Then he started moving—sort of. Dude slow-rolled through the intersection like he was the mayor of Parade Town.
My inclination was, of course, to be a turkey and blare my horn. Nevertheless, I had the Grace in the moment to pause. In my head I was thinking about how everyone behind us was going to miss the light, how inconsiderate he was, and “Doesn’t he need to get anywhere, for heaven’s sake?!” But I held off. I chose to behave like an adult.
And I didn’t just not do the impatient, hostile thing—I chose to do the patient, kind thing. I dipped into the Bird Feeder of Grace. I wished him well. I hoped he and everyone around him got wherever they were going safely.
Later, when I passed him, I noticed he was old enough to have witnessed the signing of the Magna Carta.
Now, I don’t know about you, but being rude to elderly people is so far outside my code of conduct that if I’d honked, I would’ve just felt bad about it.
So why is that Grace and not just common sense? Or Compassion? Or covering my own behind?
It might be all those things. I’m putting it in the Grace category because of the thoughts in my head—and the fact that I put them aside and chose a better way of being. It wasn’t a negative (“Don’t be a jerk”), nor a double negative (“Don’t not be kind”). I didn’t choose not to honk at him. I chose to wish him well. It was genuine. And there’s a huge difference between trying not to do something and trying to do something.
No one ever got on first—much less hit a home run—by trying not to strike out.
There are two bird feeders in our backyard. We fill them in the summer and delight in the birds that visit. But we don’t fill them in the winter. Filling them in the summer creates a virtuous circle. Feeding them in the winter might lead to over-reliance on an artificial food supply and needless harm.
Grace is like that: it enhances but doesn’t enable.
Grace gives freely without demanding anything in return.
Because we can’t earn graciousness from others—they simply give it—Grace allows us to receive without guilt or entitlement.
And in that receiving, we step outside of dog-eat-dog and quid pro quo.