I hope you are ok if I am brutally honest with you. Some of you may think I’m a nice person. I like that. I like being thought of as a nice person who thinks of others, who has compassion, someone who’s thoughtful and all that stuff.
Some of what I tell you will destroy that notion. LOL But really, this is where the rubber meets the road. Where the real you (me) meets the real God.
So, here’s a recent example. My mom met a woman at the Flagler County Senior Center, back when she went a few years ago. Now, this lady calls my mom every single day. Mom doesn’t say much, it’s mainly E talking. But every day, she calls.
Now, in the past couple of years, when my mom’s phone died and was on the charger, E literally called the police to do a wellness check. It happened twice. The first time, I gave her my number and told her to call me if she was worried. Then the second time, about a year later, she did it again. She forgot she had my number or changed phones or something. But anyway, the police showed up. Very nice guys, both times.
E is serious about reaching her friends. An admirable trait.
E was also the person my mom complained to when I wasn’t so “nice” (pretty often). So E had a view of me that was not very complimentary. That’s ok. Everyone needs a comrade they can vent to. And I was not the biggest fan of E. She was always giving advice. Very opinionated and always knowing more than me about everything. Telling mom she needed new doctors, new medicine, this, that. She was like a disturbance in the force when you really don’t want a disturbance at the moment. {Or ever.) LOL
But something has changed in recent months. It seems to be “me.” God is taking the person that I have been and making me into the person I am becoming. And this new person is so much better than the old one. I’m still pretty rough around the edges. I still have my $hitty moments (days?). But things are definitely changing.
In Matthew, there is this parable that Jesus tells about a King and at a certain point somebody asks the King, “When did I ever do anything for you?” And the King says, “When you did it unto the least of these, you did it unto me.”
I don’t think, as I did in times past, that what He said just means “be nice to people.” I think now, that He means, you are actually doing these things to me, because I am all, in all, in everyone. When I am kind to my closest family member or a stranger I’ve never seen before, I am being kind to God. It makes things so much easier when I see this. I still don’t see it that often, but more often than before. It’s like that song I mentioned a few emails ago, “What if God was one of us?”
All this to say, I am seeing E differently now. We have gotten to talk more since mom was in the hospital. She would call me for updates. I would even call her to give her updates. She has become precious to me. And because of that, she has let her guard down and sees me with kinder eyes. Jesus turned water into wine. Jesus can turn a tense, defensive, association into………. Well, into love. I love E now. Before we hang up the phone with each other now, we always say, I love you.
A mountain moved. A miracle.
God is doing miracles. Moving mountains. I just have to look with proper eyes. They are happening all the time.
I love you all!
P. S.
In Genesis 33, Jacob meets his brother Esau after many years apart. He is fearful because he knows his brother Esau must hate him for all that he had done in the past.
10 Jacob said, “No, please take the gift I’m giving you, because I’ve seen your face as if I were seeing the face of God, and yet you welcomed me so warmly.
To see God in the face of our enemies. This is a great gift.
