How often do we reallllly think about those around us..? I mean really think about them:
The people we frequently see at our usual coffee shops, the people we work with, or even the people we spend the most time with; in and outside of our families.
I feel like I have many of my Jesus smacks me in the face moments either while I'm at work or while I'm driving, and lately I've been having the same kind of revelation moment in both of those situations.
One of the women that I used to work with, has since quit our store and works right across the way at Hallmark. I texted her today, since I knew she was working, and told her to let me know when her break was so we could go get lunch together.
At around 1:30, we started walking towards the food court as I was telling her how much of an off day I've been having.
*(Throughout the duration of the morning, I had hit my head twice, broken a few cookies, spilled multiple drinks on myself, broke a cookie cake... All over the place. Hah. I was a cookie lady mess.)*
I finished my rambling when she says, "If anyone should be out of it, it should be me. I have tons going on girl.."
*(Amanda; mid-thirties, been married for 14 years, mother of two girls, and an adorable little boy.)*
So, I asked her if she didn't mind sharing, what was going on?
She said, "Well, for starters, my husband and I are pretty much Splitsville.."
Shocked, I asked her what had happened, and with no real explanation, she basically told me that he had decided that their marriage was over and he wanted out.
My heart broke for her, and for her children, and I still ache for them, but there was something she said that I didn't completely expect from her:
"After that conversation, I went and I got down on my knees.. Completely on my face before God and laid it all at His feet. If he wants to leave, there's not much more I can do except for pray. And after that moment I had before God last night, I feel so much peace knowing that I'm putting everything in His hands."
Wow.
Suddenly I felt semi-guilty about rambling on about hitting my head too many times, when she has suchhh big things going on in her life even as we spoke.
And she's just ONE story.
Lately, while sitting at red lights, I've been looking around at the numerous cars that drive by me; just in the duration of that one light.
My heart breaks as I look around and wonder how many of those faces I'm going to see again in heaven.. I wonder where they're that in their lives.. What they themselves are wrestling with..
I think of the sixteen year old girl that I work with often, whom I can tell is desperately searching for something, but she hasn't figured out yet that the partying, and drinking, isn't going to fill the space where Jesus is supposed to be.
*(I was blessed to be able to have a conversation with her today about my church, and about missions, and about the incredible atmosphere at Crossroads, and I'm interested to see where other conversations with her lead as I see her searching for something greater.)*
I think of the wife I saw today pushing around her apparent cancer-stricken husband around in a wheelchair through the mall just so he can get a peanut butter cookie. Or the single moms struggling with their fussy young children...
We see SO many faces everyday. We encounter so many fragile lives, all in completely different stages of life. We see sons and daughters of the Most High God; some struggling to see Him in the midst of their circumstances.
Do we really care about these people?
Can we allow ourselves to feel for them; pray for them;
love on them?
Even if that means we stop rambling for a little bit and shift our focus from ourselves to loving people as Jesus did; as we're called to do?
"Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us...
God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in them...
We love because he first loved us. Whoever claims to love God yet hates a brother or sister is a liar. For whoever does not love their brother and sister, whom they have seen, cannot love God, whom they have not seen. And he has given us this command: Anyone who loves God must also love their brother and sister." 1 John 4:7-16; 19-21
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