If we're honest...

"If we're honest, most of us at some time or another feel subtly proud about our strengths when we're around a weakling. For the most part, we try not to judge them, but we wonder why they can't get it together." Susie Larson, The Uncommon Woman

Okay, I'll be honest - I tend to think I'm pretty good at not doing this. Given my training in a profession of compassion, given my experiences working with the prison population - I tend to think I'm good at giving people the benefit of the doubt and acknowledging that we all have different experiences and 'there, but for the grace of God, go I." But as it happens, I encountered this very type of dilemma just Tuesday.

Tuesday when I was stopped at a light in Austin, there was a woman at the intersection asking for help. I don't remember exactly what her sign said, but it said something about how she was raising her two grandaughters ages 3ish and 18 months. At the bottom it said 'diaper size 4'. I didn't really have any food with me (a baggy of animal crackers that have been in my car for too long) but Madalyn is a size 4 diaper. So I called her over and gave her the 3 diapers I had with me. Nice story, right?

But as the light changed and I started looking for the Starbucks that the exit sign had promised (nothing like indulging in $4 coffee to make me look generous, right?) I started having the kind of thoughts this book mentions. I thought 'she doesn't look that old - why doesn't she get a job? And who's watching her children right now?' and although there may have been a quiet voice in my head warning me that I don't know the whole story, there was certainly a louder dialogue suggesting I judge this woman. There was some self-righteousness going on in my heart, even if it wasn't terribly strong or dominating.

Which makes me take notice of something else I read about - the pure in heart: 'when we honestly pursue purity in our own thoughts and hearts we will acquire a supernatural ability to see others the way Jesus sees them". Being pure in heart: having heart empty of self-righteousness and judgement. No easy feat for a human.

Piece of cake for the Holy Spirit.

Anyway, as I work towards a pure heart, hoping to strip off the sin of judgement that so easily entangles, the sin of pride that precedes a fall, I thought that making my thoughts a little bit public might help me. I don't know everything. I don't know everyone's struggle. I do know she needed diapers and I had some. I'll let the Lord do the rest of the work that he intends to do in her life. I'll keep it that simple. That pure.

So I'll close with the other quote from this chapter that really touches me: "Christ's work in us is sacred. Your process, my process, messy as it is sometimes, is holy ground." I'm asking the Lord to enable me to revere it as so, even when I don't understand.