Spam is both a delicious lunch product and an undesirable email or message. Well, OK, for people like myself Spam is a delicious lunch product. Other, less discerning folk don’t think so highly of the stuff. That’s why unpleasant emails became associated with a lunch meat. While I feel that’s an entirely undeserved slight on the tasty meat concoction, I’m willing to concede that it’s not for everybody, so I can accept Spam being associated with something nobody likes.
That’s the power of a reputation. Spam has a bad one, making it a logical choice to be connected with bad things. A good reputation, on the other hand, is highly desirable. Here’s an example of that importance.
Just the other day I received an unpleasant message from a friend. The friend, however is a known quantity. She’s a very nice person so I immediately knew that something was wrong. In fact, I was completely certain that the message had not come from her directly. The second I realized the strange combination of an unpleasant message from a very pleasant young lady, there was no doubt in my mind she was innocent.
That’s the power of a good reputation; when someone normally associated with ‘nice’ appears to be doing something associated with ‘naughty’ your mind immediately registers a disconnect. Good does not lead to bad so someone with a good reputation gets the benefit of a very large doubt before being associated with something bad. In the case of my friend, it turned out that someone had snuck the naughty message into her Facebook account and that she was indeed totally innocent. The net result was a few embarrassing moments for the young lady, but her good reputation remained intact and unsullied.
I like to think that God always assumes that we have very good reputations. Yes, I know that we often disappoint God with the reality of our actions, but thanks to the power of forgiveness, every time we do sin, it’s like a new thing to our heavenly redeemer.
It works like this: God is willing to forget our past mistakes and hope for the best when we are forgiven. His love keeps no account of forgiven wrongs. Every time we turn to God, admit our errors and turn away from them, He resets our Sin-counter and starts all over again. That’s what forgiveness does for us. It temporarily gives us a perfect reputation in the eyes of our creator and puts us into His good books. We might not keep it very long, we might not even deserve it when we do get it, but God loves us too much to let us live with a bad reputation, as long as we’re willing to own up to the truth of what we might have done to earn it.
That’s the power of a reputation. Spam has a bad one, making it a logical choice to be connected with bad things. A good reputation, on the other hand, is highly desirable. Here’s an example of that importance.
Just the other day I received an unpleasant message from a friend. The friend, however is a known quantity. She’s a very nice person so I immediately knew that something was wrong. In fact, I was completely certain that the message had not come from her directly. The second I realized the strange combination of an unpleasant message from a very pleasant young lady, there was no doubt in my mind she was innocent.
That’s the power of a good reputation; when someone normally associated with ‘nice’ appears to be doing something associated with ‘naughty’ your mind immediately registers a disconnect. Good does not lead to bad so someone with a good reputation gets the benefit of a very large doubt before being associated with something bad. In the case of my friend, it turned out that someone had snuck the naughty message into her Facebook account and that she was indeed totally innocent. The net result was a few embarrassing moments for the young lady, but her good reputation remained intact and unsullied.
I like to think that God always assumes that we have very good reputations. Yes, I know that we often disappoint God with the reality of our actions, but thanks to the power of forgiveness, every time we do sin, it’s like a new thing to our heavenly redeemer.
It works like this: God is willing to forget our past mistakes and hope for the best when we are forgiven. His love keeps no account of forgiven wrongs. Every time we turn to God, admit our errors and turn away from them, He resets our Sin-counter and starts all over again. That’s what forgiveness does for us. It temporarily gives us a perfect reputation in the eyes of our creator and puts us into His good books. We might not keep it very long, we might not even deserve it when we do get it, but God loves us too much to let us live with a bad reputation, as long as we’re willing to own up to the truth of what we might have done to earn it.
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