Father's Pain

Last night I had car trouble. I was on my way to play a baseball game across town. As I was driving down the interstate my car shut off. I pulled to the side and tried my best to get out of the way of traffic. Despite my many years of being under the car watching my dad work, I couldn't quite determine what the problem was. I had problems with the car before and knew this could be frustrating. I called me father who I knew could assess the problem easily. He didn't pick up so I called my older brother and told him I needed help. When he arrived, my father called and we spoke for a moment, he figured the alternator was bad. My brother and drove home in his car and later went back with gasoline and other items we thought might help our situation. We finally got the car back, but I missed my baseball game. Even before I spoke with my father on the phone I knew he was not going to be in a great mood about the situation. He expressed his discomfort, but did not blame anything on me. However, I still felt terrible because I knew I had caused him discomfort and he was feeling anxiety nevertheless. I thought later that night, that is the way it should be with our heavenly Father as well. When we cause Him pain, we should feel His pain. It should hurt us that we hurt Him. I think we experience this and it's a good thing that we do. When we realize that we are causing our heavenly Father pain without feeling any remorse ourselves, there is a serious problem.