Senario:
A young couple, Janice and Brett, are about to get married and are planning a wedding. Janice has a friend, Sarah, who owns a small catering business. When Janice announced her engagement and upcoming wedding to Sarah, Sarah, in all the excitement, said that her business would cater Janice and Bretts' wedding free of charge. Janice gladly accepted this offer.

On the wedding day, Sarah and her employee Maria suffered several setbacks in setting up the catering which is a nice way to say, it was a disaster. It was a trying ordeal for Sarah and Maria to try to get back on track, and Sarah became very frustrated because in the back of her mind, she was aware that while her costs were going up, there would be no compensation for it. She regretted being so rash as to offer her service free and soberly remembered that a small business such as hers could easily sink with just a few setbacks like this one. Instead of this agreement building her friendship with Janice, it served as a hinderance.

The Moral Issue:
Many people's idea of friendship is to have friends "hook them up" with free or highly discounted services from their area of profession. Friendships are like bank accounts where we are either making deposits or withdrawls. Deposits build up friendships and increase their longevity. Withdrawls, if there are too many in succession, weaken friendships and eventually end them.

In Janice's case, she was caught up in the excitement and was not thinking clearly, much like Sarah. She didn't consider what a toll this would take on Sarah's small business and failed to take the more mature path of rejecting Sarah's overly generous offer and announcing that she and Brett would pay full price for Sarah's services and that she would show friendship by preferring Sarah's service over that of her competitors, not by trying to get something free. Jesus reminds us that a laborer is worthy of his hire and that is great advice, even within the trusting confines of a friendship.

The Fix:
Though Sarah was in no position to say anything because, after all, she offered this, Janice was. Janice realized her mistake and took Brett aside and explained it tearfully. Brett suggested that they pitch in and help Sarah and Maria. As guests arrived, they too were immediately given tasks to perform and they were more than glad to help out in a trying situation like this. After the wedding, Janice asked Sarah for the bill. Sarah protested but Janice would not take no for an answer. She now saw that their long term friendship was at stake and insisted on compensating Sarah in full for her service.

A lesson was learned.

Last edited by via_dolorosa; Fri May 06, 2011 2:05 PM.
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