Walk a mile in your shoes

Sometimes, when you look at people - they seem perfectly normal on the outside. But, when you scratch the surface or dig deeper, almost everyone has some story to tell. Some wounds to hide. 

Because, we look at the outside - we don't understand people. Maybe, we don't want to.
People who are broken on the inside, struggling to make meaning and sense of things. People trying to do their day to day tasks but not able to function adequately, for reasons that they cannot fix by themselves - no matter how hard they try.

“You never really know a man until you understand things from his point of view, until you climb into his skin and walk around in it.” - Lee, Harper. To Kill a Mockingbird.  

- The child so fidgety, that he has been labeled hyper and careless.

- The man with the physical ailment, who has been called lazy.

- The kid who can't stop spinning around, but has to, because it's not right.

- The lady who has everything she needs in life, but is depressed and sad.

- The man who is always late, and has been called tardy.

- The girl who has been sexually abused but is now easily available.

- The man with the drug addiction that has taken over his life.

- The child who fears that they will never do anything right.

- The woman who finds herself to be odd.

- The man who has lost his job and fears that he will never amount to anything.

- The child with no parents because they are gone or absent or divorced.

- The couple with a marriage that cannot be fixed.

- The man who lives day in and day out, with a constant feeling of worthlessness.
- The parent with a sick child and no answers.
- The child who has seen abuse in their home.

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We might have known people like these or been one of them. Sometimes, these people have walked in and out of our lives, but we would never know their stories.

I pray that God opens our eyes and our hearts, to soften us. To help us really care.

I pray that God would touch and restore us to fullness, to wholeness, to life.