Recently on a Saturday morning, I enjoyed the rare experience of a slow start, leisurely coffee and quiet time, and then a solo trip to the grocery store. It is telling that I’ve reach the point in life where that is what I consider to be a luxurious morning. Little did I know the lesson on the benefit of the doubt I was about to learn in my leisure.
It also happened to be one of those weeks that I swear is some sort of truth of the universe – we run out of all the things at the same time. From paper towels to laundry detergent, black pepper to horseradish, I had a much longer list than normal as I resupplied staple goods. As I leisurely walked the aisles, I managed to think of a few additional items I’d failed to put on my list and picked up a few other things of questionable necessity along the way. To say my grocery cart was full is putting it mildly.
Business at the store was picking up as I made my way to the checkout line with several of us arriving to the limited number of open lanes at the same time. I let another customer take the first lane I came to and looked to the next one open at the end of the lanes. That lane had only one other customer in line and they had only a few items and were almost done checking out. I proceeded to load my groceries onto the conveyor belt – sorted by how they should be bagged, of course – and when it was my turn, I chatted it up with the cashier.
There was no one at this lane bagging groceries, so I told Debbie, the friendly cashier, that I would be happy to do it. I jumped to the end of the checkout lane, and began to bag my groceries. I noticed that, strangely, there was only one little thing that holds the bags, so at Debbie’s suggestion, I grabbed another one from the adjacent aisle and kept working (happily, I might add…I have lots of opinions in general, and the proper way to bag groceries and put them in a cart happens to be toward the top of the list).
We made swift progress and I noticed that Debbie was a grocery scanning machine – the woman move at a very fast pace. We moved so quickly, that I never really returned to the “normal” position the customer stands in – you know, the one in front of the card reader? I’d inserted my debit card before I started bagging groceries and Debbie, helpfully in my mind, took my card out for me and handed it to me in my bagger position. I thought to myself, “She gets it! Women do not want to spend enormous amounts of time in Publix on a Saturday!”
As I hustled away with my overflowing cart and approached the door, I was struck with worry that I’d forgotten or missed something. I turned around for one last quick check to make sure I’d collected all of my groceries. In that moment I saw something for the first time that morning. Glowing, in bright orange, at the opening to Debbie’s lane, was a very clear sign that read “10 items or less.”
My heart stopped and my cheeks flushed. I realized that a line of about 4 more customers had lined up behind me (and they all had no more than the limit), and every single one was staring me down.
I. Almost. Died. The rule follower in me kicked into fight or flight mode and I quickly dashed out the door fleeing to the safety of my mini-van. How could I have been so clueless? How on earth did I miss that I was in the wrong lane with a well-overloaded grocery cart? I was distraught over completely violating a sacred foundation of grocery store etiquette.
Once I had my car loaded and I was safely in the drivers seat, I glanced at my receipt…and I counted line by line what all I’d purchased. To my dismay, my clueless self had come through that lane with – wait for it – FORTY-ONE ITEMS. Forty-one. Thirty-one more than was allowed.
And sweet Debbie never said a word.
I wondered as a I sat in the car (horrified and then hysterically laughing at myself) if I would have been so gracious. Each time she swiped an item over the scanner and made it beep as the price was registered, it must have been like nails down a chalkboard. But, she didn’t say anything to me to point out my mistake. She didn’t passively treat me with frustration or distance. She didn’t (to my knowledge) engage with other customers to make faces or whisper about me behind my back. She cheerfully greeted me and, while moving swiftly to process all of my purchases, she chatted with me genuinely and kindly.
All the while aware of my mistake. My hunch is that Debbie gave me the benefit of the doubt and figured that, rather than intentionally disregarding the sign at her register, I must have missed it in my hurry and was unaware of my transgression.
How often to I extend the grace of the benefit of the doubt to others in my life?
Our human, self-centered selves can so easily get in the habit of jumping to the worst conclusions about people who make mistakes in our presence. We instantly jump to assume that that guy who cut us off in traffic is a jerk who characteristically walks all over people. We assume the mother who forgot to RSVP to our child’s party is disorganized. When a colleague is short or sharp in response, we label them as difficult and uncaring.
We make these assumptions in a split-second and it seems to me that this swift, almost unconscious mental jump is a habit that reflects the way we view people around us. This habit comes easy and can be under the radar of our own self-examination if we aren’t careful. Those small, often hurtful and incorrect assumptions can transform over time into even larger broad strokes with which we unfairly paint people. And these can be the strokes that are much more noticeable and hurtful to those we encounter.
Casting out eyes downward as we come upon a person in need at an intersection. Jumping to immediate, uninformed conclusions when we learn of a couple at church going through a divorce. Making swift judgement on the way or place someone else chooses to worship.
Jesus called us to train our assumptions to be like His.
The way we treat others – both in our intentional actions and in our instantaneous assumptions – is how we are actually treating Him. Jesus told his followers:
“The King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.'”
Matthew 25:40
So, how do we reorient our programming to extend the benefit of the doubt before we jump to negative – and often incorrect and hurtful – assumptions about others? We submit our hearts to the love of Christ. Receiving that full love of Jesus – that we do not deserve – and then conditioning ourselves to extend that same undeserved love to others is the place to start. The New Testament reminds us that love is where extending the benefit of the doubt begins:
“Above all, love each other deeply, because love covers over a multitude of sins.”
1 Peter 4:8
That can be the thing about love, too. Showing love isn’t typically overt. The deepest love we show is how we treat people around us – both our dearest ones and those we only meet once in life. Making a habit of treating everyone with love – love like Jesus’ – conditions our hearts to extend the grace of the benefit of the doubt.
