The Golden rule
Proverbs 8:13 To fear the Lord is to hate evil; I hate pride and arrogance, evil behavior and perverse speech. 14 Counsel and sound judgment are mine; I have insight, I have power. 15 By me kings reign and rulers issue decrees that are just; 16 by me princes govern, and nobles—all who rule on earth.
These verses remind me of my senior year in HS.
I got caned for something I did over Christmas break, I was arrogant. I didn’t take it seriously and instead treated it like a joke which was an insult to the teacher involved, this was perverse speech. Later this teacher wanted me expelled and to be fair the rules justified that. However the headmaster took into account that the incident (evil behavior) had taken place near my birthday and used that to put me on two months detention instead of expelling me. If I had been expelled I also would have forfeited my place at University as that would have violated the conditions of my being accepted. So this decision which was merciful was also a salvation to me.
Those experiences were my lessons in issuing a decree that is just. I then had a final exam on what I had learned.
The teacher that I had insulted and that wanted me expelled gave a final exam. He gave us ten essay questions and said that our final exam would be 3 of them. I was thinking this will be easy, the night before the exam I’ll prepare. Around 7pm I pull out this sheet and look at the first question, it was very broad and I had no idea what it was talking about. I pulled out our textbook and my notes and realized this was a governing question for one of the chapters in the textbook, a chapter we had never discussed during the entire semester. I figured it would take me at least two hours to prepare that question. So I put it aside and went to the second question and again, same thing. Now I am angry and I ask myself “which of these questions did we actually cover in class?” I go through all ten and find that 3 questions referred to the three major topics we covered that semester. I figured he has to ask at least one of these and if I am lucky he’ll ask two. Since I have no idea what to say on the other seven I decide I will make sure I get these questions 100%. I spend the next five hours using my notes and the textbook to write extensive comprehensive answers to these three questions. Then I spend another two hours rehearsing them so that I can write this down by memory. All three questions that I had prepared for were on the exam! I spent the entire 2 hours writing from start to finish, non stop. In my whole life I have never aced a test better than that.
A few days later he posts the grades and I had the lowest score in the class, 23%. I was one of the three top students in that class, if he had told me I had gotten 95% and another student had gotten 97% I wouldn’t have believed it. This was retaliation by this teacher.
The first thing I do is calculate what my final grade in the class would be. This test did not bring my grade down enough to nullify my acceptance to the University, so in the grand scheme of things this score didn’t mean anything to me. But, what about others? If he does this to me and I do nothing will this embolden him to treat others this way? I knew if I reported this to the Headmaster he would be fired and I did not want to be the obnoxious foreigner who comes and gets others fired. My friends in the class were telling me I needed to turn him in. So I prayed about it. I was in the Royal Air force (RAF) and he was the commanding officer. We had to return our uniforms and my coat was missing a button. I decided I’d let the teacher decide his judgement. I would let him know I was missing a button and whatever he decided would actually be the judgement that I would judge him with. I went up to him at lunch, he wouldn’t even look up at me and he was trembling uncontrollably. I realized he had given me that grade without looking at my paper! I told him I was missing a button on my jacket and he said “forget it”. So I forgot it and never turned him in.
40 years later he seeks out my brother at a school reunions to tell my brother what a stand up guy I was. He made sure my brother passed the message on to me. Can you imagine remembering one pain in the butt student for 40 years?
Also, I learned about a year ago that my birthday was the 3rd day of Passover. When I look back I see that God spoke through this Headmaster to let me know that He was judging me with mercy in view of that day.
My behavior was proud, arrogant, evil, with perverse speech. All the things that the Lord hates. However, mercy can be the result of counsel and sound judgement and result in a just decree. Because of mercy that teacher didn’t have his career ruined and I didn’t have my life ruined.
Just like James said, Mercy triumphs over judgement. I believe that with what judgement we judge we shall be judged, and so I will strive to be merciful in judging others as I also would like to be judged mercifully.
Proverbs 8:13 To fear the Lord is to hate evil; I hate pride and arrogance, evil behavior and perverse speech. 14 Counsel and sound judgment are mine; I have insight, I have power. 15 By me kings reign and rulers issue decrees that are just; 16 by me princes govern, and nobles—all who rule on earth.
These verses remind me of my senior year in HS.
I got caned for something I did over Christmas break, I was arrogant. I didn’t take it seriously and instead treated it like a joke which was an insult to the teacher involved, this was perverse speech. Later this teacher wanted me expelled and to be fair the rules justified that. However the headmaster took into account that the incident (evil behavior) had taken place near my birthday and used that to put me on two months detention instead of expelling me. If I had been expelled I also would have forfeited my place at University as that would have violated the conditions of my being accepted. So this decision which was merciful was also a salvation to me.
Those experiences were my lessons in issuing a decree that is just. I then had a final exam on what I had learned.
The teacher that I had insulted and that wanted me expelled gave a final exam. He gave us ten essay questions and said that our final exam would be 3 of them. I was thinking this will be easy, the night before the exam I’ll prepare. Around 7pm I pull out this sheet and look at the first question, it was very broad and I had no idea what it was talking about. I pulled out our textbook and my notes and realized this was a governing question for one of the chapters in the textbook, a chapter we had never discussed during the entire semester. I figured it would take me at least two hours to prepare that question. So I put it aside and went to the second question and again, same thing. Now I am angry and I ask myself “which of these questions did we actually cover in class?” I go through all ten and find that 3 questions referred to the three major topics we covered that semester. I figured he has to ask at least one of these and if I am lucky he’ll ask two. Since I have no idea what to say on the other seven I decide I will make sure I get these questions 100%. I spend the next five hours using my notes and the textbook to write extensive comprehensive answers to these three questions. Then I spend another two hours rehearsing them so that I can write this down by memory. All three questions that I had prepared for were on the exam! I spent the entire 2 hours writing from start to finish, non stop. In my whole life I have never aced a test better than that.
A few days later he posts the grades and I had the lowest score in the class, 23%. I was one of the three top students in that class, if he had told me I had gotten 95% and another student had gotten 97% I wouldn’t have believed it. This was retaliation by this teacher.
The first thing I do is calculate what my final grade in the class would be. This test did not bring my grade down enough to nullify my acceptance to the University, so in the grand scheme of things this score didn’t mean anything to me. But, what about others? If he does this to me and I do nothing will this embolden him to treat others this way? I knew if I reported this to the Headmaster he would be fired and I did not want to be the obnoxious foreigner who comes and gets others fired. My friends in the class were telling me I needed to turn him in. So I prayed about it. I was in the Royal Air force (RAF) and he was the commanding officer. We had to return our uniforms and my coat was missing a button. I decided I’d let the teacher decide his judgement. I would let him know I was missing a button and whatever he decided would actually be the judgement that I would judge him with. I went up to him at lunch, he wouldn’t even look up at me and he was trembling uncontrollably. I realized he had given me that grade without looking at my paper! I told him I was missing a button on my jacket and he said “forget it”. So I forgot it and never turned him in.
40 years later he seeks out my brother at a school reunions to tell my brother what a stand up guy I was. He made sure my brother passed the message on to me. Can you imagine remembering one pain in the butt student for 40 years?
Also, I learned about a year ago that my birthday was the 3rd day of Passover. When I look back I see that God spoke through this Headmaster to let me know that He was judging me with mercy in view of that day.
My behavior was proud, arrogant, evil, with perverse speech. All the things that the Lord hates. However, mercy can be the result of counsel and sound judgement and result in a just decree. Because of mercy that teacher didn’t have his career ruined and I didn’t have my life ruined.
Just like James said, Mercy triumphs over judgement. I believe that with what judgement we judge we shall be judged, and so I will strive to be merciful in judging others as I also would like to be judged mercifully.