Be Incarnational Love

I went to see The Help a while back with a couple of friends. On our way out of the theater, one of them asked what prejudice we might have in our modern society that 50 years later will be unfathomable. Thinking that there was a time in American history when persons of a darker skin tone were not considered human was unfathomable for me. I was still a bit speechless from the journey of the characters through the movie and found myself searching my own heart: Who are the marginalized today that will make us look foolish?

With Advent season here, I have been thinking about this question again. I have some specific answers, for me, that are not attractive, but here goes. I am very uncomfortable with nursing homes that smell like stale urine and bland food, where it seems that we store old people who have outlived their usefulness, where residents might wander up to you and kiss you or scratch you without knowing who you are (or who they are). I also don't do well with people who are mentally ill or mentally handicapped. Their stories can be difficult to understand and their moods sometimes unpredictable. I also find it difficult to be around them when they don't "behave" appropriately in public. This discomfort began when I was in high school and there were often mentally handicapped adults on the bus home who were acting out sexually which was both gross and embarrassing.

I find myself ashamed of these prejudices, but it is really that I am awkward and uncomfortable more than truly prejudiced. I don't know how to be in the presence of these individuals, how to relate to them. What do you talk about to people who will not understand? How do you live among people who cannot do what you can? Each of these groups are so different than me. I care for myself. I know who I am. I find purpose and worth in my work. I understand social norms and boundaries and when I cross them, I mean to, usually. Perhaps this self reliance and pride is what made me struggle so much after losing my job. Perhaps this self determination and arrogance is what gets in the way of my relationships with people that I care about. Perhaps these traits also make me more reserved and resistant to surrender.

And then I think about Jesus. I thought about him at church on Sunday, about how little I know him. What I know about him is the difference he has made in my life and the lives of others, but I couldn't pick him out of a lineup. I don't know where he lives that I could send him a letter, or know his email address for that matter. I don't know what he likes to do in his free time, if he even has any time he isn't speaking things into creation & changing hearts from stone, or if he has "time."

When I think about what his life might be like, figuring it has to be more amazing than I could even imagine, since his ways and thoughts are higher than mine, I wonder why he loved us so much, how he loved us so much. He left his glorious existence with the Father behind and slipped into the temporary & feeble flesh of man. He chose incarnation to demonstrate his love for us.  Choosing this, he knew most couldn't understand him, wouldn't accept him and instead that we would scratch him, curse him, refuse him. He is so much more than all of our goodness piled together, and yet he tolerated us. He really didn't tolerate us; he spent time with us. He ate dinner. He celebrated. He taught. He laughed. He worked. He suffered. He sacrificed. He died. He rose. He loved. He promised.

Our sins don't put him off, our humanity doesn't gross him out or our messiness embarrass him. Jesus entered into the mess of humanity on purpose, lovingly. And I wonder if incarnation wasn't to be a one time event over 2,000 years ago, if perhaps he wants us to follow where he leads.

While I love Jesus and pray that he changes my heart, digging out the sin that hides there, in this season of Advent, I have been praying specifically that I might trust him, the way he trusted the Father, that I might not be afraid of stepping into the messiness of others lives, and instead do as Jesus did, so that I can show them that they are loved, too.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Whose messiness do you have trouble stepping into? Is it the child with the runny nose whose parents don't seem to mind her carefully enough? The homeless man who needs a bath and clean clothes? The mentally ill woman who wanders the streets clutching a doll as though it were her child? The family from a foreign culture whose food smells funny and speak a language you cannot understand? The Christian who is snarky and self righteous? (Uh-oh, there is another prejudice for me!)

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Christ in His Distressing Disguise

Image
When I was much younger, I learned about this remarkable woman, Blessed Teresa of Calcutta, then simply known as Mother Teresa. As a teenager herself, she had chosen to serve God by leaving her home in the former Yugoslavia to go practically around the world to India and become a nun. There she taught school, but she was distracted by the poor on the streets. Longing to care for them, she needed to be released from her teaching duties. Eventually a new religious order, the Missionaries of Charity, was formed by Mother Teresa to serve them, the poorest of the poor. I wonder today what attracted me to her. I didn't know much about India. The pictures of the suffering, the cachetic bodies that barely resembled humans, puzzled me. Growing up with movies and air brushed photographs, as well as a skepticism of news and government organizations, it can be hard to believe. How can there be such incredible suffering in my world? Mother Teresa was doing God's work; I know that was exciti
Read more

Blog Carnival-Seasons

Image
It was all so much simpler in my spring.  I suppose it is for everyone.  That is why babies and puppies and newness are squealed over.  I have been struggling.  Spring has long gone.  The leaves are falling. I loved what I had, what once defined me. Without it now, I feel like a crab without a shell-              vulnerable...                            homeless...                                           dry in spirit. I know, that all is not lost. I know, things change. I know, that God,              who brought me from there to there once,              will bring me from here to there again. I know, the story is not over. I know, the season will change, again. I wish my heart knew all this as well. Check out more blog entries on Seasons at the Carnival .
Read more

Blog Carnival: Community

Image
Blog Carnival: Community Community is getting to be a buzzword that hardly seems recognizable.  It has become permanently connected with a metrosexual worship leader at the hip church which has an outreach into some impoverished place.  But is that community? Yesterday I wrote about Facebook's social networking site.  Did you know that there are more than 300 million active users and that 50% of their active users (returned to the site in the last 30 days) log on to Facebook in any given day and that the average user has 130 friends on the site? Is that community? Do we really have a community or do we talk so much about it and request friends by the busload because we desire it intensely? We were made for community.  Creator said it was not good for that first man to be alone.  Even Creator was not alone.  We need to walk with others.  We need our village.  We need them to not only walk with us and love us and share our burdens, but to challenge us, to force us to grow.
Read more