What separates us?
Is it our own agendas? Or maybe a fear of being rejected or ignored? Is it the busy-ness that consumes every minute of our days? Could it be the “need” for alone time? Is it the constant pull of direction towards better options? Maybe it’s the small annoyances humans can trigger.
But what if we lived interruptable. Inconvenienced. Still. Aware. Eyes open.
What if we looked around more. What if we listened more.
What if we had a 360 degree awareness rather than walking in our blind spots? What would we see? What would we hear? Who could we help? Who could we encourage? Who could feel known? Who could be heard? Who could we intercede for in prayer? What beauty would our eyes see differently? What perspectives could we alter? How would we see people?
Maybe, just maybe, the people and things surrounding us aren’t there to inconvenience us.
Maybe we can tear down the walls of “inconvenience” that separate us. Maybe we can push aside that small voice of judgement and annoyance at the people and world around us, and see them through understanding and reason.
Maybe today we can see someone differently. It could be the homeless man on the corner who daily has to write his perception of himself on a piece of cardboard. Maybe he doesn’t know that that’s not who God says he is. Maybe he simply doesn’t know his worth in Jesus.
Same goes for the man who isolates himself in the coffee shop and doesn’t feel he fits in with the preoccupied coffee drinkers, waiting to be approached in conversation. Waiting to feel accepted rather than ignored. Maybe this is the only place he can go.
Maybe these “things” don’t define these people. In fact, there’s more.
[Beauty goes far beyond what the eye has the slightest ability to see]
If God wrote who He says you are on a piece of cardboard, it might go something like this:
Loved. Heard. Known. Accepted. Wanted. Adopted. Friend. Redeemed. Free.
And we get to hold that sign up for the world to see.
Maybe we can help those around us walk in just that.
