Today is our Wedding Anniversary. Ken and I have been married 29 years. It’s kind of hard to believe! First Corinthians 13 is often referred to as the love chapter in the Bible. It describes love and makes this very significant statement - “Love keeps no record of wrongs.” In marriage, it’s easy for us to remember the things that have hurt us or ways we’ve been mistreated. We can be good “record keepers.” But over the 29 years of my marriage, I have had to learn forgive and “forget.” I don’t know that we ever truly forget, but we destroy the list of wrongs that we have recorded in our minds.
To drive home my point, here’s a story I heard about toilet paper. It seems kind of fitting to tell a story about toilet paper this year. Toilet paper is something that we took for granted until recently. How many of you have had to go hunting for toilet paper? That is something I never expected to do in my lifetime. Would you agree that we are living in crazy times?
A husband and wife who were having a hard time getting along. In particular, the husband was irritated because he was the only one who ever changed the toilet paper roll, when it ran empty, to a new roll. He complained frequently to his wife that she never took the time to change the roll, expecting him to always do it. She disagreed and said that she changed it as much as he did.
The husband got so frustrated by this that he decided to start collecting all of the empty toilet paper rolls that he had removed. He did this for quite some time. In so doing, his frustration just kept escalating. One day, he and his wife got into another argument about the toilet paper rolls. This time, to prove his point, he went and got the large plastic trash liner that he had filled with the left-over toilet paper rolls. He took his collection and dumped all of the empty rolls at her feet.
She looked at him, said two words, and walked away. Her two words? You’re sick.
Would you agree that in the grand scheme of life it doesn’t really matter who changes out the toilet paper roll? Yet, it is often the relatively minor things that can set us off the most. One of the lessons that I am slowly learning in life is that I can be right (I change the TP roll way more often than Ken does) or I can be happy. Right or happy? Sometimes, you have to choose between the two.
If you are someone who feels the need to prove that you are right all the time, decide if it’s worth it. Would you rather be right or be happy? Would you rather demand justice or be filled with contentment? Do you need your own way all the time or are you willing to compromise? Do you demand respect or do you pour on love?
“Love is patient and kind. Love is not jealous or boastful or proud or rude. It does not demand its own way. It is not irritable and it keeps no record of being wronged.” 1 Corinthians 13 (NLT)
My conclusion - Love does not keep a bag of used toilet paper rolls. Love keeps no record of being wronged.