My terrific idea

The other day I had a terrific idea.   I’ve lived long enough to know that not every idea I come up with is great, but that particular one was.  I liked it and wanted to move full steam ahead to implement it.  There was one catch however.  It wasn’t entirely my decision to make and I had to present it to another person for consideration.  And yup – that person did not like it.What to do?Here are some things I considered doing:

• Get a posse together of everybody who agrees with me and let the person see how many people are on my side.
• Bombard the person with statistics, blogs, emails and opinion poles to help them see the light.
• Sulk.

Fortunately my daily devotional time came before I could implement any of the above considerations.  After reading some scripture, my emotions calmed down and my mind stopped yelling instructions at me.  I prayed through my prayer list and afterward realized how many more important things were going on around me.  I prayed for the person who did not like my idea and, whilst praying, I realized how much they meant to me and how little my idea meant in comparison.Here is what I did do.

• I told the person that I valued their opinion and would not be partial and give precedence to my ideas only.
• I gave sincere thought to their idea and realized it made a lot of sense.
• I still liked my idea but acknowledged it was just one of many that could be implemented successfully.
• I took up my cross and followed Jesus.

We did not go with my idea and the project was implemented another way.   My ego took a bit of a bump but I gained in two significant ways:

• A strengthened relationship with my "adversary".
• A successful outcome to our project anyway.

“But the wisdom that comes from heaven is first of all pure; then peace-loving, considerate, submissive, full of mercy and good fruit, impartial and sincere.”  James 3:17Question: Fortunately for me, the other person's idea was strategic and had value.  In the light of the above scripture verse, what do you think I should have done if they had a really bad idea?