Today, I had a blessed experience which reminded me of an email I recieved long ago...
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++++++++++++++++ ARE YOU JESUS+++++++++++++++++++++++
A few years ago a group of salesmen went to a regional sales convention in Chicago. They had assured their wives that they would be home in plenty of time for Friday night's dinner.
In their rush, with tickets and briefcases, one of these salesmen inadvertently kicked over a table which held a display of apples. Apples flew everywhere. Without stopping or looking back, they all managed to reach the plane in time for their nearly missed boarding. All but one.
He paused, took a deep breath, got in touch with his feelings, and experienced a twinge of compassion for the girl whose apple stand had been overturned. He told his buddies to go on without him, waved goodbye, told one of them to call his wife when they arrived at their home destination and explain his taking a later
flight. Then he returned to the terminal where the apples were all over the terminal floor. He was glad he did.
The 16 year old girl was totally blind! She was softly crying, tears running down her cheeks in frustration, and at the same time helplessly groping for her spilled produce as the crowd swirled about her, no one Stopping and no one to care for her plight.
The salesman knelt on the floor with her, gathered up the apples, put them back on the table and helped organize her display.
As he did this, he noticed that many of them had become battered and bruised; these he set aside in another basket.
When he had finished, he pulled out his wallet and said to the girl, "Here, please take this $40 for the damage we did. Are you okay?" She nodded through her tears. He continued on with, "I hope we didn't spoil your day too badly." As the salesman started to walk away, the bewildered blind girl called out to
him, "Mister". He paused and turned to look back into those blind eyes. She continued, "Are you Jesus?"
He stopped in mid-stride, and he wondered. Then slowly he made his way to catch the later flight with that question burning and bouncing about in his soul: "Are you Jesus?"
Do people mistake you for Jesus? That's our destiny, is it not? To be so much like Jesus that people cannot tell the difference as we live and interact with a world (shopping, working, reacting to others that are serving us) that is blind to His love, life and grace.
If we claim to know Him, we should live, walk and act as He would. Knowing Him is more than simply quoting Scripture and going to church. It's actually living the Word as life unfolds day to day.
You are the apple of His eye even though we, too, have been bruised by a fall. He stopped what He was doing and picked you and me up on a hill called Calvary and paid in full for our damaged fruit.
Let us live like we are worth the price He paid, then we are truly special.
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Today, while on my lunch break there was a blind man that was walking next to me while I was sitting down at a table in the cafeteria eating my lunch. With his walking stick as an aide, I noticed he was navigating his way through the cafeteria, but I didn't really know why it took him so long to leave the table area I was at. He was using his stick to make sure he didn't walk into something or someone, but more strangely he was bending down feeling the ground with his hands - I assumed he just wanted to make sure he wouldn't trip on any backpacks. The cafeteria was full, and I can sense a lot of the other students were looking at him too because he was acting very...not as normal. I've seen this same blind man once before walking the halls with his stick-aide so it was strange seeing him actually feel the ground for something.
Then all of a sudden another girl student came up to the blind man and said to him, "Sir, are you missing something?"
He responded, "Yes, I seem to have misplaced my backpack and I'm trying to find it".
She said, "Sir, I can help you, let me find it for you".
So she went to a table far away, grabbed a roller backpack that was laying on the ground, and brought it to the blind man. I guess she had known that was his backpack - I didn't know how.
She said, "Here you go Sir, I believe this is yours".
I saw him smile and say, "Thank you so much. I've been looking for this".
She smiled back and said, "Your welcome, Sir. No problem at all".
With his roller backpack at his hands and his walking stick-aide in the other, he then tried to navigate his way out of the cafeteria, through the maze of tables.
Again the same girl came up to the blind man and said, "Sir, if you would like, I'd be happy to help you find your way out"...
Then again, the blind man smiled and said, "I'd love that. Thank you so much".
....Wow, I thought. She is such a nice person.
Then I realized, at that moment, I saw Jesus. That's Jesus, and how lucky was I to have witness sush a beautiful act of His love, right before my very eyes.
Thank you, God - for reveiling yourself to me. It may have been a very subtle way, but I saw You. Help me to never forget that You are always there for me. Thank you so much.
.....I am left speechless, and I am left inspired.
Always,
Aaron
