THE EYES OF CHRIST

 By Stephanie Pauline

 

I had been beaten down.  I was seven months pregnant now and just barely 18 years old.  I was standing in the check out line of an auto parts store in a broken down strip mall in Minneapolis.  My boyfriend was loading me up with paint equipment, a sander, and all the thing we needed to fix up the 200 dollar bondo-mobile we had purchased that was our only form of transport.  He was oblivious to the fact that the load was cumbersome with my now protruding belly, and I didn't dare say anything.  I remember he had left me to run back to the auto body section of the store to find some more items, and then it happened.  The man in front of me turned around and motioned with his hands toward my heavy load, "May I carry that for you please?"  His voice was warm, gentle and kind, and when I timidly glanced up, his blue eyes glistened with a softness I hadn't seen in ages.  I stammered a quick, "N-No Sir." and quickly dropped my gaze lest my boyfriend come back and see me talking to a man.  Still that split second had been enough, tears filled my eyes and I had to blink them back and hide my face so no one could see.  Even as we drove out of the parking lot I dared peek out of the window, longing to see the hope I had unexpectedly found in that man's eyes once more.  He was gone.

All these years later I can still remember that moment vividly.  At that point in my life I walked into a room two steps behind my son's father, my eyes on the floor, if I dared to look up it was only for a couple seconds I was so afraid that someone would see that I was dying inside.  You know what I was even more afraid of?  I was even more afraid that "they" would not see.  That "they" would not bother to look - to look and really see me; not form and face, but me.  Most never look, most don't have eyes to see.  At that time I had thought that was because I was somehow already lost, dead and worthless.  Now I realize it is because all those others are busy hiding their own sense of dying inside. 

What's my point?  Well I guess it's just this: sometimes we think we have to preach, or do some "big," measurable, noteworthy thing to serve Christ.  That's all well and good, but what do you make then of the fact that I'm not feeling compelled to write about the sermon I heard last Sunday, instead I'm taking this time to tell you about the eyes of a man I saw in a auto-parts store over a decade ago now.  Sometimes serving God looks simply like offering a word, a hand, a smile, a glance.  Sometimes the power of God to begin to transform a life can be translated into a gesture.  Something in that man's face, that faithful servant of God, whispered a hope deep into my soul that maybe, just maybe I mattered a little.  Maybe I wasn't completely lost to love after all.  Hear this, servants of God: sometimes its not about what you do, but about how you do it.  Sometimes all you need to do - is be the eyes of Christ.