I Like You, Do You Like Me?

Some good thoughts recently shared by my friend and parishioner Gordon Pierce:

A Pondering – Expectations

I believe one of the major causes for relational disconnection is probably one person’s expectation of another. The expectations held by a husband are not met by his wife, a wife’s are not met by her husband, parent’s are not met by their children, a child’s by the parents, a church’s congregation are not met by their pastor, on and on it goes. 

There are several way by which I came to the conclusions I have reached is by listening for sound bytes on the subject of Christian Concealing, and web sermons addressing family relationships. Reading my Bible and a book on the subject of prayer by a saint in the 19th century named E. M. Bounds I gained insight on relationship issues. 

One problem I have discovered about expectations is some people believe that happiness and security rests on another person’s performance. They fail to realize that the other person is busily walking through their life, not realizing they are expected to meet any wants or needs. The person who is failing to meet the other’s expectations is probably overwhelmed by what they have to do in the course of a day. Social media is not helping them in this regard. 

I can add a typical Sunday school teacher thought at this point which is; a person can only find true happiness and security in God. However let me add this to that thought. The Bible and the E. M. Bounds book state “God chastens those He loves.” He may be using the expectation failing person’s performance in chastening the person who has had an expectation. 

Unfortunately many people who are being chastened drift away from God instead of towards Him. 

Another expectation issue is simply this. One person’s expectation of the other is unrealistic. I believe we are all guilty of this misjudgment. Lets pray that our Lord will give us the grace to become realistic with our expectations, or to not have expectations at all. 

I have a short story to share on unrealized expectation. An elderly man was helping A fourth grade student. The student had a homework assignment that directed him to correct a miss used adverb in each of seven sentences listed. The student expected the elderly man to quickly identify and express which word in each sentence was the incorrect one. Much to the student’s dismay the elderly man struggled to help the student quickly. It had been sixty years since the man had to concern himself about incorrect adverbs.