60 years for $4.80

 

“Sometimes, little things make a big difference…”  Nino Varsimashvili

 

  What would you be willing to give up for $4.80? How long would you be willing to give up something of significance for a little less than $5.00? 

  For 60 years Ted Sams regretted missing his high school graduation. Now that he’s 78, Sams can finally call himself a high school graduate, On Friday, May 27^th, he donned a cap and gown and received his diploma with the class of 2022 at Southern California’s San Gabriel High School. 

  Back in 1962 when Sams was a high school senior, he got in trouble, was suspended five days before the end of the school year, and ended up missing a crucial final exam that he had to make up over the summer. 

  He recently told a local TV station, “When I went back with my grade, they wouldn't give me my diploma because I owed $4.80 for a book, and so I just walked away and said forget it.”

  Fortunately, the high school still had Sams’ original diploma locked away in an old filing cabinet. He beamed as he walked across the graduation stage at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena and received his diploma. He said, “over the years, I complained to my kids a number of times about how $4.80 kept me from having my diploma.”

  It’s amazing how something small, like $4.80, can cause us to make a big, bad decision with lifelong ramifications?

  God has matured me a lot over the years (I still have a long ways to go) but I remember a day when someone giving me a one-finger wave would cause me to go nuclear. When I was growing up, my Dad would chew us out if someone forgot to turn a light off. Have you seen one of those Youtube clips of McDonald’s or some other fast food joint and a customer got the wrong order? Some of them are of a customer crawling through the drive-thru window or over the counter to attack the cashier who messed up their order. It’s a $5,000.00 reaction to a $5.00 problem.

  There’s a verse tucked away in the Song of Solomon that describes this, “Catch the foxes for us, the little foxes that spoil the vineyards…” (2:15). A little fox – big damage! 

  Many a parent has had a meltdown with a child over something insignificant like spilling a drink or leaving a toy out. Married couples fight over the trivial, like putting the toilet paper on the wrong way or forgetting to empty the garbage…or a truly major crisis, leaving just a bit of milk in the jug without replacing it.

  I wish that I could say that I never get angry over the small but unfortunately, I’m guilty, too. My lack of patience with slow drivers is a continual area of spiritual growth. My sanctification is still working its way down to my right foot.

  Personally, I think pride was part of Ted Sams’ problem and it was further complicated by stubbornness. Stubborn is defined as “having or showing persistent determination not to change one’s attitude or position on something, especially in spite of good arguments or reasons to do so.”

  The Bible contains several examples of stubbornness. Probably one of the most well-known ones was Pharaoh. Remember the story? God told Pharaoh, “Let my people go,” but Pharaoh was stubborn and wouldn't let them go. So God sends plague after plague, and after each plague, Pharaoh cries out, “OK, I'll let the people go.” Yet after God lifted the plagues, the Bible records that Pharaoh “hardened his heart” and wouldn’t let God’s people go. The end result was the 10^th plague, the death of the first born in every Egyptian home. It was the end result of Pharaoh’s stubbornness. We lose a lot when we’re foolishly stubborn and needlessly dig in our heels.

  Ted Sams lost sixty years because of stubborn pride. I wonder how many relationships suffer needless estrangement because of the same thing. Often there’s been an argument, then a rupture in the relationship. It may have gone on so long that the combatants no longer even remember what the original offense was. They just know that they’re angry at the other person.

  In his book, The Preaching Event, John Claypool tells a powerful story about identical twin brothers who never married because they enjoyed each other’s company so much. When their father died, they took over his store and ran it together in a joyful collaboration.

  One day a man came in to make a small purchase and paid for it with a dollar. The brother who made the sale placed the dollar on top of the cash register and walked the customer to the door to say goodbye. When he returned, the dollar bill was gone. He said to his twin brother, “Did you take the dollar bill I left here?” “No, I didn’t,” answered the brother. “Surely, you took it,” he said, “There was nobody else in the store.” The brother became angry: “I’m telling you,  I did not take the dollar bill.”

  From that point, mistrust and suspicion grew until finally, the two brothers could no longer work together. They put a partition right down the middle of the building and made it into two stores. In anger, they refused to speak to each other for the next twenty years.

  One day a stranger pulled up in a car and entered one of the two stores. “Have you been in business very long here?” the stranger asked. “Yes, 30 or 40 years,” was the answer. “Good,” continued the stranger, “I very much need to tell you something...Some 20 years ago, I passed through this town. I was out of work and homeless. I jumped off a boxcar. I had no money and I hadn’t eaten for days. I came down that alley outside and when I looked into your store window, I saw a dollar bill on the cash register. I slipped in and took it. Recently though I became a Christian. I was converted and accepted Christ as my personal Savior. I know now it was wrong of me to steal that dollar bill...and I have come to pay you back with interest and to beg your forgiveness.”

  When the stranger finished his confession, the old storekeeper began to weep as he said, “Would you do me a favor? Would you please come next door and tell that story to my brother?” Of course, with the second telling, the two brothers were reconciled with many hugs and apologies and tears. Twenty years of hurt and pain and a broken relationship based not on fact, but on mistrust and misunderstanding, but then healing came; reconciliation came, because of that stranger’s love for Christ.
  I’m glad Ted Sams humbled himself and got his diploma. But he still lost sixty years. How about you? Is there someone you need to reconcile with? How much more time do you want to lose? Please humble yourself and fix it…today!

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