Thursday, October 25, 2012

Look First At The Person In The Mirror

“Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? How can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye."

-- Matthew 7:3-5

It was a lecture on kindness. Laughable, really, because of the person giving the lecture. She wanted others to treat new comers nice and be careful of what they say. It all sounds good. Christian even. Except that the person giving the lecture drives people away with her hatefulness.

She’d never admit that, of course. Her sharp tongue is such a part of her personality that I’m not even sure she notices. Except that people turn away from her. Her ugliness drives them to avoid her and the fellowship that would benefit everyone.

Of course, she isn’t always that way. She has her favorites and there is something truly grade school about that. These are older folks and this is a senior center. Surely, favorites have no place among adults.

And her promotion of her own church drives a wedge, turning folks either away from Jesus or, certainly, away from that church. One man told me he wouldn’t go back senior center. “If you’re not one of them (a member of that church),” he said, “they won’t have anything to do with you.” That is not how Jesus taught us to live.

Certainly, no one around us claims to be perfect or even nice all the time. We all could use a refresher course on using words that build up and don’t tear down. We should be careful to build bridges and not cause harm.

We do cause harm. All of us. We use words carelessly. We look down on people, especially those we don’t like. We never consider that maybe, just maybe, we’re the problem. Or at least part of it.

This woman can be so very nice. She can be kind. She gives of her time to others. When she is not blasting them for being less than who she thinks they should be.

Like she is. Like she was. I’ve heard stories of her childhood and the strict parents who never let her participate in school activities like the other children. She was an outcast, an outsider where she should have belonged. Now she rules her own domain with an iron will and cruel words. And she does it all in the name of Jesus.

None of us can ever truly see ourselves, especially when we’re looking down at others. Jesus spoke such words of wisdom. We’d all do better to look in the mirror before we condemn someone else of being who we are.