identitySPECIALIST

This morning – I was fascinated by the most interesting thing.  I typically pick up coffee at Starbucks on Sunday morning – it’s part of my pre-game ritual to prepare to lead worship.  I recognized a few people in the shop, and saw one of the baristas – that’s normally back there on Sundays – in line with me to get some coffee for himself.  You can tell this guy used to be a Marine or something.  He just looked like it, and he also had tattoos all over.  You don’t normally see them when he’s working, but I happened to see 22:15 and my first thought was, this guy is a Christian.

What happened next caught me off guard.  He grabbed his coffee and water and headed outside where he had staked his claim on the corner table.  He sat down and I saw that he had a book and a Bible – now, he even had a Bible cover so he was a hardcore Bible reader with highlighted passages and notes all over it.  That’s not what caught me off guard.

He then set up his drinks and his books and his Bible.  He was getting comfortable, and then he grabbed a cigarette and lit up.  He lit up to study God’s Word, and that’s not even what caught me off guard.  What caught me off guard was my thought after he did it.  I wanted to judge him.  In fact, I thought “he is mixing his identities.”  For whatever reason, I thought that he was mixing 2 identities that kinda didn’t go together.  What caught me off guard was not that he had lit up, but that I had judged him.

That didn’t last long though.  I smiled that he was reading his Bible.  He was an avid Bible reader.  Who am I too judge someone who reads the Bible in a way that I wouldn’t?  I cannot see his heart.  I can only judge the outward appearance.

How do you think you would have reacted?