“No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace.”—Hebrews 12:11
I’ll never forget the day I got a knock in the teeth from my mother—verbally, that is. It happened during a long-distance phone conversation. I had interrupted her three times. She snapped, “Will you be quiet! You know, your brother couldn’t slide a word in the last time you called him. He said to me, ‘Carol is so rude. She never lets anyone else talk.’”
Ooh, that smarted. Hanging up in a daze, I thought, I’m not like that…am I? I took a closer look. Wasn’t I nicknamed “Mighty Mouth” in junior high? Didn’t my high school English teacher often quote “Silence is golden” to me?
My mother and brother were right. I was cruising through conversations even on a red light. It was time someone stopped me. I reached for the phone to make a couple of thank-you calls.