The price of mercy is mercy!
The story is told of a boy raised in a privileged environment by loving parents. He broke the law and was sent to the penitentiary for ten years. During all that time he was too ashamed of what he had done and of the heartache he had brought to his parents even to write to them. They wrote to him many times. But each time he refused their letters. He refused to believe they could ever forgive him, or ever want him to be their son again.
When his sentence was up, he finally sat down, worked up all his courage and wrote them a letter. “I’ll be getting out next week,’ he wrote. “I want to come home, but I don’t know if I’m forgiven. If you want me back, tie a yellow ribbon in the oak tree beside the railroad tracks. If I see a ribbon in the tree as the train passes our farm, I’ll know it’s OK to come home. If not, I won’t even get off the train, and you’ll never hear from me again.”
“I’m Going Home!”
The day finally came. All the way home he sat nervously on the train, his apprehension mounting by the mile. Would he be welcomed back or turned away forever?
The train rounded the bend and started up the grade that led past the family farm. The anxiety was unbearable. He asked the man sitting across from him, “Will you please look out the window and tell me if you see a ribbon in the oak tree beside the tracks?”
The man turned and looked out the window. “Son,” he said, “there’s not one ribbon in that oak tree. There are dozens of them! Hanging from every branch and every limb! There are ribbons on the barbed wire fence, on the rose bushes near the house—there are yellow ribbons from one side of that farm to the other! What does it mean?”
“It means", the young man shouted as he jumped from the train, “that I’m forgiven! And I’m going home!”
Happy are those who demonstrate kindness in action. Happy are those whose self-centered lives have been crushed and reshaped by the Master’s hand to be full of mercy. Happy are those who restore the fallen. Happy are those whose pity is greater than their prejudice. Happy are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy.
Source: Being Happy in an Unhappy World
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