Remembering the individual

For the last three years I have had one project on my to-do list. To organize my 70,000+ contacts into a database and to sort through 8,123 emails. I have been spending an hour or so each night working on this project.
As I type in the names of people I have met through the years, it really got me thinking.
How often do we forget the individual? I think this is a thing many of us struggle with. We often have to be reminded of faces from high school and remember to email back the sweet person that commented on a blog.
On the World Race, we literally are meeting hundreds of people…and sometimes it is hard to remember the individuals. In Africa, one of the major concerns many people had was to not be forgotten by us once we returned to America.
This was a promise not many of us could keep.

I then started thinking about what LOVE looks like.

If we are to act as love, what does that mean? I still am figuring it out, but one thing I am learning is that people want to be loved, known, and remembered.

I mean, the God who created the universe not only loves us, but knows us. He even numbers the hairs on our head (Matthew 10:30). I can’t tell you that I will know how many hairs are on your head…but I can tell you, that I will look at you as an individual.

I think sometimes we have to remind ourselves that every person we pass has a story. That the person that cuts you off while driving, may have a wife in the hospital. That the homeless man living near the 14th street subway has two children that live in California. That the child asking to be played with on the playground will end the sex trade industry.

Below are pictures of some individuals I have met this year, this is what LOVE looks like: