We cannot (not may not) be part of someone else’s relationship with God. There is no player 3 in this game. We might be like the pilot who guides a ship out of harbour to the open seas, but once there, he then relinquishes control. That ship’s journey is not ours.
I look at Chris and still see the girl I married. I remember thinking how God might see my dear departed friend Ruth dancing in church, a slightly plump, very short woman with an effervescent personality. I had the sudden vision that God saw her as I see Chris – like her husband Ron, God saw the young girl, full of life and love, dancing with joy in her relationship with Him.
This should always give us pause for thought when we are embarrassed or ashamed on behalf of someone else, or find ourselves judging their spirituality, their relationship with God. What we see is not what He sees. We are not player 3, we have no place in their relationship, we are outside it. We can TRY to imagine what God sees, we can even ask him to show us. But until we can see past the superficial things, we can never succeed.
We can look at others and try to imagine how He sees them, but I imagine Christ sees people in an entirely different way from how the rest of us do.
(Barbara Brown Taylor – People in church we won’t sit next to?)
