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Snapshot cameras & snap judgments

Oftentimes, it’s easy to see one snapshot of a person’s life and make a “snap” judgement. I’ll give you two personal examples of this. Back in 2011, I was given the great opportunity to speak on stage & share the Gospel with the women at a church in Tiburon, Haiti. If someone were to take a snapshot-judgment of my life then, I’d probably gain a lot of respect from fellow Christians. What a wonderful thing I was doing! 

Fast forward to 2017, I was admitted to the behavioral health floor of the hospital (for the second time). I sat down to a meal with a man struggling with PTSD and on the verge of suicide when his neighbor called for help & got him admitted into the hospital. Through both of our very broken mindsets, God graced me the opportunity to share with him the hope that can be found in the Bible. I encouraged him to read his Bible that night, and the next morning at breakfast he told me that he read the Bible for the first time.

Pause. Had someone taken a snapshot-judgement of my life through the window of that behavioral health floor of the hospital, I doubt many Christians would gain my respect. I’d probably gain a lot of judgement, shame, and encouragement to pray more.

But what if I peeled back the layers of those two scenarios and showed you a glimpse into my heart on both occasions? If I’m ashamedly honest about it, I was very prideful to be able to be on stage and share the Gospel with the Haitian women back in 2011. After all, look at me. I must be somebody that God would use to share the Gospel with people in other countries! In the 2017 scenario of me, I readily recognized that hospitals are the great equalizers. In the hospital, I sat down to meals with drug addicts. The second time I was admitted was right before a hurricane, so (if you didn’t know this) many homeless people check themselves into the hospital, so that they have a safe place to stay during hurricanes. I ate with several meals with homeless people while I was in the hospital. And you know what I came to realize? 

— 

It was God’s grace that allowed me to speak in Haiti, prideful and all. And it was God’s grace that held me in a mental hospital. Twice. 

Be careful when you look at the outward appearances and make snap judgments. God’s looking at the heart. 

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