When I (Brent) was a kid we lived in northwest Indiana, right outside of Chicago.  Many days my dad would come home for lunch and ask if I wanted to go to the Cubs game.  If we ate fast and traffic was good we could get there in time for the first pitch (they played a lot of afternoon games because Wrigley Field didn't have lights).  The Cubs weren't any good, so the tickets were plentiful.  Still, with all those trips to see the Cubs, I grew up a White Sox fan.  

So you can probably understand my horror when my young daughter announced that she was a Cubs fan.  (We decided to skip the intervention.) 

Remembering all the fun that I had going to games with my dad, I promised to take her to a game one summer.  South Bend wasn't that far from Chicago, so I thought it would make for a good father/daughter date.  There was just one problem.  I couldn't find tickets.  The Cubs still weren't any good, but going to Cubs games had somehow become en vogue.  (In the years since my childhood it had evidently become trendy to go to Wrigley to hang out with friends - because the baseball still wasn't very good.)  The few tickets I found were unaffordable.

I felt terrible.  I had made a promise to my daughter that I couldn't keep. 

25:14

Like clouds and wind without rain is a man who boasts of gifts he doesn't give.

I'd been like a rain cloud that never rained - or maybe more like a sun that never shone.  I let my daughter down.

So I apologized, and decided that the next summer I would make it up to her.  And I did.  I managed to get tickets for American Girl Doll Day - and the give-away that day was a free Cubs uniform for your doll.  Yeah!

Read Proverbs 25

It's easy to make a promise.  It's a lot harder to keep one.  But sometimes we go ahead and promise because we know that it's what the other person wants to hear.  Have you ever found yourself saying things like this?

• "Sure, I'll give you a call" (but you know you're not going to)
• "I'll put in a good word for you" (but you can't even think of one)
• "Thanks for the invite, I'll be there!" (but you know you'll be out of town that day)
• "Sure, if you want to pick up the gift, I'll split the cost" (but then again, maybe not)
• "It will be on your desk by Monday" (but not next Monday, maybe not even the one after that)

But sometimes we break even bigger promises.  We don't follow through.  We do the opposite of what we say.  We renege on a deal.  We tell our mates we'll change, but we don't even try.  We tell our kids we'll be there, but we don't show up.

Relationships depend on trust.  When we make easy promises we don't keep, we damage those relationships, often critically.  That's a foolish risk to take.

Today's wisdom:

Don't make a promise you don't intend to keep!

Brent Wood