What does my look say? I can look with understanding. I can look with disdain. I can look with compassion. I can look with contempt. And when I look what/who am I seeing? Am I seeing only what is visible or am I looking deeper into what is behind the visible?
I want to be Jesus in this world. While many times I am not successful, I can know that I am representing Him true to His character when I do what He did. Jesus first looked at a person. Jesus looked with understanding and He loved. A good self examination looks at the who, what, where, why, when and how. Let's see how much of that I can get through in what can be read in just a couple of minutes.
Who--who am I going to look at as Jesus did/does? Today I will have many opportunities to look at others. I will look at family, co-workers, clients; I may look at strangers on the street, the grocery store clerk, the postal worker. I will focus on the brief interactions I have today to see how intentional I can be with a look of care and compassion. This will be a bit of a challenge because I'm focusing on those I may not even get a chance to truly speak with and probably won't know the results, but I'm going to give it a shot.
What--what am I going to communicate with my look? I mentioned above that I am going to give a look of care and compassion. Hopefully, I'll be able to add a word to my look that confirms what they may see in my eyes, but that's it--care and compassion.
Where--where will I do this? I will be at work today and tonight I will attend a women's Bible study so that is where I will concentrate on my brief interactions. It may be the postal worker or delivery person at work; it may be another woman across the room at Bible study.
When--when will I do this? I will start today. The time is now.
Why--isn't this the real question? Why would I care to do this at all? For me the answer is both simple and complex. I truly want to be Jesus in my world, so the why is as simple as that. The deeper truth in this is that I want others to have what I have--a relationship with Jesus that fills my being. I want others to find the peace I have in the middle of a storm-tossed life. I want others to know the freedom found in forgiveness, both my being forgiven and my being able to forgive others. Best of all, what I want for others is to have the certainty that they will be able to spend eternity with Jesus loving and being loved.
How--how will I know I have accomplished what I set out to do? How will I actually do it? I will have to remember that Jesus looked at the person. I will be intentional about seeing the person, not their job or their clothes, where they are or what they are doing. I will look at the person. My goal in order to know I have achieved my aim will be to have one person look back at me, realizing we have truly connected in a way that goes beyond our brief encounter.
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