Today was a really cool day. A friend and I trekked to the main branch of our city's library, just to hang out and read. It is a really neat building; there is a very large new building built right next to, and attached, the original library. The juxtaposition of the now main, and modern portion of the library nestled behind the classic architecture, which now houses the fiction sections, is very beautiful and poetic.
And people talked to me today. Complete strangers. All I had to do was make eye contact and smile. It was amazing how that little double action brings such big results.
Someone asked me to watch his stuff at the adjacent computer station while he was up. Another gentleman, walking through the library with a couple women complimented me on my hair. One of the library employees stopped to chat for a moment; warning me of the impending snow, sharing the fact that she was from Panama originally and they didn't get weather like this. 75 degrees all year round. I told her I was from further north so I'm used to worse than this. Then she said I looked like the prettiest girl. I was so touched.
But I don't think the compliments were really meant for me. Why did I look these people in the eye and smile? Because I want to love them like Jesus does. I want to see what He sees when he looks at people. And I think these people saw me catch their eye and saw me smile and saw Jesus in me. I don't know how to explain it. They saw the inner joy I have that I can't keep to myself.
It's the kind of joy that makes me smile. The kind of joy that slows down to let someone enter the highway from an entrance ramp. The kind of joy that wants to overlook the outside cover of a person and dig into the pages of their book.
I said it already but it's amazing when you look a total stranger in the eye and genuinely smile. Not a polite, required by etiquette or social norms and customs sort of smile. A genuine smile that recognizes the divine in that stranger, that sees the reflection of our Creator in a person worthy of love and attention and my time.
My time is not my own anyway--it's God's. How better do I use it than in His service to simply love His people?
And people talked to me today. Complete strangers. All I had to do was make eye contact and smile. It was amazing how that little double action brings such big results.
Someone asked me to watch his stuff at the adjacent computer station while he was up. Another gentleman, walking through the library with a couple women complimented me on my hair. One of the library employees stopped to chat for a moment; warning me of the impending snow, sharing the fact that she was from Panama originally and they didn't get weather like this. 75 degrees all year round. I told her I was from further north so I'm used to worse than this. Then she said I looked like the prettiest girl. I was so touched.
But I don't think the compliments were really meant for me. Why did I look these people in the eye and smile? Because I want to love them like Jesus does. I want to see what He sees when he looks at people. And I think these people saw me catch their eye and saw me smile and saw Jesus in me. I don't know how to explain it. They saw the inner joy I have that I can't keep to myself.
It's the kind of joy that makes me smile. The kind of joy that slows down to let someone enter the highway from an entrance ramp. The kind of joy that wants to overlook the outside cover of a person and dig into the pages of their book.
I said it already but it's amazing when you look a total stranger in the eye and genuinely smile. Not a polite, required by etiquette or social norms and customs sort of smile. A genuine smile that recognizes the divine in that stranger, that sees the reflection of our Creator in a person worthy of love and attention and my time.
My time is not my own anyway--it's God's. How better do I use it than in His service to simply love His people?
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