Regrets Only

               Regrets Only the invitation read in the space where RSVP normally resided. Trying to meld this phrase which conjures up negative emotions and the festivity of a party or wedding left me puzzled. So few people respond to an RSVP these days , I can’t imagine anyone would call saying, “No, we’re not coming.” The interaction would force an excuse. I had a pastor years ago who said he had quit telling people he missed seeing them in church on Sunday because it seemed to obligate a response and he didn’t want to be the cause of folks having to lie to him.

               Regrets Only can apply to relationships. A former dear friend died recently and I felt deep regret at her passing. She was still a young woman at age fifty-five and I regretted her seven-month battle with cancer. A few months before her diagnosis, she had retired and was excited to see where God would lead her next. I knew something was amiss when her treatments started the day she was diagnosed. My main regret was the fact that our friendship had waned a few months before she was diagnosed.



Disciple Bible Studies

               We became fast friends when we rode to a Lay Speaker Training together. Over the next four years, we were in two intense Bible studies together and my husband and I attended the Couples Bible Study she hosted in her home. We led worship together at a local nursing home on the Second Sunday of each month and were both part of a year-long leadership development program for small membership Methodist churches.

               And then the unthinkable happened. My pastor felt I needed to be disciplined because I reported some worldly activities taking place in the church and a violation of the Safe Sanctuary policies. Against the guidelines of the Methodist Book of Discipline, he called together the Pastor-Parish Relations Committee and the Lay Leaders from all three churches in our Charge. My friend was a member of the PPRC and decided to stand with the pastor and seven other people as they took an approach that was neither Biblical nor according to the Discipline.

I was devastated and my family ended up leaving the church I had loved and supported and been an active part of for thirty-three years. I could not sit under this man who told me he was higher than God in these three churches. I could not sit in the pew and worship with people who thought taking the Biblical approach to reconciliation was NOT the right thing to do.

Although my friend and I made an attempt to save our relationship, it was never the same again. I forgave her, we had lunch together, were friendly toward each other but we had lost the depth in our relationship. I offered my services for any needs she had during her illness and was told, “I have a whole list of people who have offered to help.”

The Greek word for regret is metamelomai (#3338 in the Strong’s) and occurs six times in the New Testament. It means to experience a change of concern after a change of emotion, usually causing us to fall into emotional remorse afterwards. Repentance is tied to regret, causing us to understand that the thing we regret included some sort of sin.

Per Isaiah 9:6, Jesus has been my Wonderful Counselor and Prince of Peace through all of this. Do you have regrets in your life? I suppose we all do. How did you work through yours? Did you find that there was sin involved in the situation causing your regret? Did you repent and find freedom?

Be blessed, Dear Ones and allow God to give you renewed joy today-

Cathy

Isaiah 9:6 ESV     “For to us a child is born, to us a son is given; and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God,Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.”