January 25, 2008

I have on my computer a picture that reminds me that faces don’t tell the whole story. Usually we have to look deeper to find out who people really are. The converse is also true. People won’t know who we are unless we share with them more than our face.

Now we utilize this truth to our advantage. We avoid awkward questions with a big smile. We mask disappointment with apparent boredom. We know it’s going on, yet we tell ourselves the lie, and believe it too, that we know what our colleagues are all about.

Of all the children at the school, Jadine was the most charismatic. Not only was she lit up most the time, but she’d light up the room she occupied too.

That malnutrition had stunted her growth didn’t faze her. That she couldn’t hear didn’t stop her. That her parents had given the responsibility of raising their daughter to someone else did not concern her.

Who am I kidding? Of course these things affected her, some perhaps very deeply. But we like to put each other in tiny boxes and then we limit their stories to just what we know, or to what we’ve assumed.

The funny (or frightening) thing is that other people are doing the same thing to us. Unless we intentionally share ourselves.

Paul uses the phrase, “eyes of the heart” to talk about insight. In the letter to Ephesus he uses it in a prayer for deeper spirituality. I’d like to think that we can have eyes in our heart to better see each other. And maybe our hearts need mouths and ears too.

“I pray also that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints, and his incomparably great power for us who believe." Ephesians 1:18-19

With full commitment,
Pastor Steve

PS. To see a picture of Jadine, go to
http://sonomasdachurch.com/personal/hearteyes.html