His mom sounds like me.
I thought a lot about getting into heaven but not much about living with God.
I like this idea of learning to see Christ.
Tragically, the bullet had damaged the part of his brain that recognized faces. He now looked at his wife without a spark of recognition; he couldn’t recognize his own mother. Even the face in the mirror was foreign to him—he couldn’t tell if it was a man or a woman.
He’d become face-blind—a condition that affects millions of people.
Here’s a second story, closer to home: As a young boy, I often saw my mom as the rule maker. She decided when I could play and when I had to go to bed or, worse, pull weeds in the yard. She obviously loved me. But too often and to my shame, I saw her only as “She Who Must Be Obeyed.”
Only years later did I come to see her as a real person. I am embarrassed that I never really noticed her sacrifice or wondered why for years she only ever wore the same two old skirts (while I got new school clothes) or why, at the end of the day, she was so tired and eager for me to go to bed early.
Perhaps you’ve noticed that these two stories are really one story—for too many years, I was, in effect, face-blind. I failed to see my mom as a real person. I saw her rules but didn’t see in them her love.
Not mentioned was that he saw her effort (maybe mostly in hindsight) but failed to see in it her love.
There’s a short verse in John that I love. It tells of a group of outsiders who make their way to a disciple with an important request. “Sir,” they say, “we would [like to] see Jesus.”
That is what we all want—we want to see Jesus for who He is and to feel His love. This should be the reason for most of what we do in the Church—and certainly of every sacrament meeting. If you’re ever wondering what kind of lesson to teach, what kind of meeting to plan, and whether to just give up on the deacons and play dodgeball, you might take this verse as your guide: will this help people see and love Jesus Christ? If not, maybe try something else.
This guidance makes it very simple. I don’t think this can lead anyone astray.
When I realized that I was spiritually face-blind, that I saw rules but not the face of the Father’s mercy, I knew it wasn’t the Church’s fault. It wasn’t God’s, and it didn’t mean everything was lost; it’s something we all have to learn. Even the early witnesses to the Resurrection often came face-to-face with the resurrected Lord but did not recognize Him; from the Garden Tomb to the shores of Galilee, His first followers “saw Jesus standing, and knew not that it was Jesus.” They had to learn to recognize Him, and so do we.
This is what drove Bex to give up.
What is your favorite story of Jesus? I suspect it shows the Son of God reaching out to embrace or offer hope to someone on the margins—the leper, the hated Samaritan, the accused and scandalous sinner, or the national enemy. That kind of grace is amazing.
Try writing down every time He praises or heals or eats with an outsider, and you will run low on ink before you leave Luke.
As I saw this, my heart leapt in loving recognition, and I began to feel that He might love me.
Everyone needs to feel that God loves them, otherwise they can have no durable eternal hope.
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