Wings

I had a friend who used to drive a milk truck. He told me this story 20 years ago and I have never forgotten it. He worked in the country and would often stop his truck somewhere along the dusty dirt roads of Alabama to take his lunch. One sunny day while he was eating he looked up and saw a hawk flying around in the sky. It was being tailed by two very small birds. It was obvious that the hawk had something the little birds wanted pretty badly because they kept swooping and pecking at the hawk. This continued for a while, the much larger hawk circling and circling with the smaller birds doing everything they could to torment it. As he watched this, my friend thought to himself, " Pretty soon that hawk is going to get sick and tired of those little birds picking at him like that and he will turn and let them have it." but it was at that moment that something unexpected happened. Rather than turning to fight with the birds the hawk began to stretch its wings. It began to take broad deep strokes and began to pick up speed and altitude until it got so high that the little birds could no longer follow.
Sometimes its hard to be the bigger bird. Sometimes its hard to be the bigger person. Especially when you know you could defend yourself. Sometimes its hard to walk away from the scene of the accident in silence, refusing to offer your litany of evidence that would exonerate you. Sometimes its hard to let go and trust God. Let's be honest sometimes you want to turn and let them have it. Sometimes letting it go is the last thing you want to do. But you have to make a choice. You can't soar into the high places of the tomorrow God has for you while circling in flight with those who want to keep you down on their low level.