Learning to See Others
Series: Building Better RELATIONSHIPS
October 3, 2021
Intro
My added welcome... to each of you here and online....It’s a gift to share this time together... growing together.
I want to begin by asking us to reflect for a moment.
Are you a safe person?
I don’t mean are you likely to become violent... I mean... are you safe for others to approach....and relate to? Do you relate to other people as a threat you need to defend against.... or as a gift to be opened?
What kind of space do you create for others?
As we continue in our focus and series on building better relationships... this may be one of the most important questions.
This series is about building better relationships in every point of relating. We are engaging the qualities that can help us develop better relationships with those we are just beginning to engage...as well as building better relationships with the family and friends who we have known for many years.
No matter what the state of our relational life is... we can all move further from isolation to intimacy.... we can all develop more meaningful connection.
It’s not easy. We don’t love others as naturally as we’d like.
So we are looking at the one who embodied the very nature of God...that is Christ...and how he loved in this world...how the love of God was reflected in the patterns of his life...which we can embrace as our own.
Ephesians 5:1-2 (MSG) ?Watch what God does, and then you do it, like children who learn proper behavior from their parents. ....Observe how Christ loved us. ... Love like that.
And today... the pattern we are engaging is how to see others. Learning to see others as Jesus saw them.
Because the way we see people determines how we treat people.
Most of us may presume that we see people with respect and treat them well...but what about if they aren’t being kind to us? What if they are annoying... or offensive?
Or worse... if I don’t see what they can do or me...maybe I don’t see them at all.
So how does God see people? What did Jesus see? As the Biblical account of Matthew describes...
Matthew 9:36?When he saw the crowds, he had compassion on them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd.
Matthew is telling us how Jesus saw the crowds. The crowds. Not the select. Not the special. But the crowds which represent the common nature of people like you and I...and everyone else in this world. We can assume such lives included the same offensive attitudes and behaviors that are common among human life.
There is no sense that they held much that Jesus could get from them... as he seemed to have already understood how the hearts of humanity would turn on him when any sense of transactional desires for power were deemed done with.
He sees these common lives with compassion. Compassion is not simply having pity for someone at a distance. It’s a word that speaks of actual connection. The word used here... translated as compassion... speaks of how another life is allowed to be taken in... and to affect us deep inside. It’s about bringing them in toward yourself.
It’s helpful to understand that it is not simply the opposite of seeing someone critically. It isn’t a matter of being blind to the problems in another person. Seeing with compassion is about seeing more that simply seeing with critical eyes. Seeing critically and seeing compassionately are not simply opposites but rather a matter of one being more fundamental than the other.
A parent may be critical of the child’s behavior...but they are more defined as a parent than a judge... more given to restore than to condemn.
And this is what we see in Jesus. [1] Jesus said...
“I did not come to judge the world, but to save the world.” – John 12:47
Jesus doesn’t dismiss the behavior of others... but he sees more than simply our behavior. He saw they were lost... they had wandered ...gone astray... like sheep without a shepherd... leaving themselves harassed and helpless.
He didn’t come to simply pronounce the judgment we face...but to provide the grace to come home.... and be who they were meant to be.
We have a great example of how Jesus saw someone...and related differently... which we can read an account of in the Gospel of Luke... 19:1-10
Luke 19:1-10
Jesus entered Jericho and was passing through. 2 A man was there by the name of Zacchaeus; he was a chief tax collector and was wealthy. 3 He wanted to see who Jesus was, but being a short man he could not, because of the crowd. 4 So he ran ahead and climbed a sycamore-fig tree to see him, since Jesus was coming that way. 5 When Jesus reached the spot, he looked up and said to him, "Zacchaeus, come down immediately. I must stay at your house today." 6 So he came down at once and welcomed him gladly. 7 All the people saw this and began to mutter, "He has gone to be the guest of a 'sinner.'" 8 But Zacchaeus stood up and said to the Lord, "Look, Lord! Here and now I give half of my possessions to the poor, and if I have cheated anybody out of anything, I will pay back four times the amount." 9 Jesus said to him, "Today salvation has come to this house, because this man, too, is a son of Abraham. 10 For the Son of Man came to seek and to save what was lost."
This encounter has long been a joy to imagine….and it captures how Jesus loved people in provocative and powerful way.
Jesus is once again nearing a city. It’s the city of Jericho... which was no small town. It was a town with plenty of merchant activity...and a choice spot for tax collectors. Rome knew that the best way to collect taxes was to employee some local Jews to do the work... which meant finding some willing to turn on their own people and serve the oppressor. And even worse...such tax collectors were known to use the opportunity to demand even more than Rome required...and to take for themselves...which made then hated by both their fellow Jews...and the Romans. You can imagine the depth of hate the people felt towards one of their own both betraying his own people in service to the oppressor...and cheating his own people out of greed.
A tax collector was the very definition of a moral outcast... the lost cause. In fact Jews of tis time often use the phrase sinners and tax collectors... suggesting that tax collectors were seen as a class of their own.
We don’t know just how Zacchaeus actually carried out such a notorious role...but we do know that he must have done his job well...because he was a chief tax collector...and he oversaw other tax collectors. Its safe to say that he likely had more money than most...and was despised above all.
It’s not hard to imagine that he felt the weight of isolation. [2]
We know from these brief words is this...
It says Zacchaeus wanted to see who Jesus was.
It says he was short... and so he would find it challenging ... because he also didn’t wanted to be seen. Notice that it says... “he went out ahead”... probably to avoid being noticed... and to find a spot where he...being shorter than most...could see.
Where NOBODY would see him.
How many lives may want to see Jesus... but are afraid of people seeing them?
Zacchaeus thought he was in a position where nobody would see him.
Or so he thought.
And so begins the way of Jesus.
Jesus sees him... calls to him... invites himself over... and it becomes a complete reset for Zacchaeus. In the end... a man came down from the tree in which he was hiding in shame.
How can we learn to “see’ people like Jesus?
How can we learn to “see’ people like Jesus… with compassion? ….that allows us to be “safe” and approachable?
The first thing we can learn from Jesus ...is to....
1. Slow down... and maintain a margin for grace.
There’s a lot of people in this scene... and Jesus is just reaching his destination...so we can imagine a scene in which it’s time to get through the crowds and get a meal and some rest. It’s the type of moment we just want to get to what we need.
But Jesus lived in what some call the pace of grace. He never moved faster than the speed of love... and love requires slowing down.
We see how Jesus slowed down. How slow? Long enough to really see people.
How many of us know all too well that our busyness competes with how well we stop and care for others. We need to maintain a margin for grace.
As Carey Nieuwhof recently expressed,
“You are …most kind when you have the most margin.” - Carey Nieuwhof
Many of us have probably felt the challenge of being so rushed we are not really present amidst various exchanges we may go through. We have a sense of the challenge to maintain a margin for grace.
Jesus was able to stop and look up ...and see him...and though on his way... he used the rhythm of a meal... a break for lunch.
Amidst such a meal... there is the ability to listen to your heart...not just your head. The Holy Spirit is able to help us see. Our head might raise walls of busyness and fear and judgment...but if we slow down... the Spirit will allow compassion.... space for another.
What we first see… is the outward… and we male a thousand calculations to help manage life ... it’s easier for our minds to simply create categories ,,,,and then associate them unconsciously... with clothing… context… behavior… social status… moral nature…all in about one second.
That is what labels serve… like “tax collector.” Everyone knew how to see a tac collector.
And the truth is that most of us have similar ways of seeing those who we can categorize as homeless...old... young...Republicans … Democrats … people who dress a certain way.
If we hope to connect… it means we will have to slow down to actually see the individual.
Jesus didn’t lose sense about his destination... but he also didn’t stop seeing people along the way.
Slowing down to become available... means becoming both physically and emotionally available. We all know that it’s possible to be physically with someone and yet not really paying attention to them. Try to talk to someone who’s engaged with their smartphone or TV... you really don’t have their full attention.
How did he know his name? We can only imagine.
But at the center... a man is seen.
We live amidst 10 million people... and there are so many who just wish someone could see them.
And I would venture to say... there is a part of every one of us...that may not feel seen.
Here’s a question that can be hard to ask... but so healthy.
Would the people who know you best say you’re largely available or distracted?
2. See beneath the outward behavior… to the soul that bears God’s image.
Without anything else in our sights…we tend to see people’s outward appearance and behavior…in relationship to how that does or doesn’t serve our fragile sense of value.
How easily we tend to see people outwardly.
We can tend to see people as merely annoying ...as those with needs which should be avoided.
We can tend to see people as a threat to our own fragile sense of value.
We can tend to see people as reflecting some element which we can judge ... as a means to feel a sense of superiority.
Jesus saw more than a tax collector. He saw a sheep without a shepherd.
He didn’t go to the home of a tax collector.... he wasn’t just relating to a tax collector...but to one who was created to be and live as God’s child.
This is where Jesus confronts our religious nature. By that I mean our human ways of trying to be religious.
Religion sees people as the enemy...and wants to condemn them as sinners. Jesus sees sin as the enemy...and wants to reclaim them by grace. [3]
How easily Jesus could have joined the common way of seeing Zacchaeus... as a betrayer... a traitor... labels that speak of what he does... as if it is who he is. But Jesus saw beneath the behavior that had come to define people’s lives...he saw then with understanding. He never excused what they did by speaking of them as simply victims of someone’s else will...but he understood that they had given themselves to a system of destruction...and that they could turn back...and through him... be reclaimed and restored. That is what Zacchaeus appears to have found in Jesus.
Jesus saw what was beneath the grime. [4]
Jesus said ... “Stop judging by mere appearances...” - John 7:21, 24
How can we learn to see people with the grace of God... to see through what may elicit judgment... and develop compassion?
Many might presume that Jesus was failing the way of righteousness. Many saw that Zacchaeus was a tax collector… living in a life of sin…and he needed to feel the shame of the community to help provide a clear message. What didn’t Jesus understand about that?
As best as I can understand… Jesus wouldn’t have dismissed the association of being a sinner….and even of Zacchaeus being faced with that….but Jesus bore the power to see more. Sinner was not his first nature… his original existence… not what he most fundamentally was created to be… nor what should be accepted as the most fundamental claim over his life.
What Jesus saw were lives created to live in the love and will of the Father.
Sin was no one’s original nature… it was by nature a sheep gone astray… and to repent was to turn around back to the arms of God.
Jesus doesn’t see people simply as sinners in the sense that sin is simply a behavior… seeking behavior modification. Sin is about identity… about what we are choosing to identify with and act upon.
We can tend to simply judge people as good or bad... condemn them to a state of value or lack of value.
Compassion sees the tragedy of sheep that have gone stray... needing to be found and led back. Jesus didn’t focus on the symptoms but rather of the cure. He represents the Father’s love for His children that have not come home. God is set on reclaiming lives,
What the crowds could not see...and Jesus did...is that God was not finished with Zacchaeus. And He is not finished with any of us.
If we are to build better relationships...we need to learn to see people like God does...and to treat them with compassion. This means we need to see what lies beneath how we may appear…and sees the sacred value of every life. [5]
Brennan Manning spoke a challenging truth, when he wrote,
“How I treat a brother or sister from day to day, how I react to the sin-scarred wino on the street, how I respond to interruptions from people I dislike, how I deal with normal people in their normal confusion on a normal day may be a better indication of my reverence for life than the antiabortion sticker on the bumper of my car.” - Brennan Manning [6]
Treating people as valuable is not easy.
And this leads to the next thing we learn from Jesus ….
How could Jesus communicate the reality of what he saw?
Well… I think Jesus also teaches us to…
3. Exercise the power of initiating.
Jesus doesn’t sick back to see if Zacchaeus will come out and express his hope. He’s up in a tree…. It’s sort of obvious that he is only hoping from a distance. So Jesus takes the initiative.
Jesus calls out to Zacchaeus. [7]
Can you sense how significant that is? So many people can seek attention by becoming dramatic and demanding ....but demanding attention is entirely different than simply being given attention.
There is nothing more powerful than our initiative ...because it expresses what is really within us...not merely responding to what we HAVE to respond to ...but what we WANT to respond to.
Love never just does what is required. Love doesn’t just see people as an obligation... as a duty to fulfill when it is required.
Love initiatives.
Our initiative speaks.
Jesus makes a significant point of this when there is conflict in a relationship.
We won’t venture into all that he teaches… but the one striking element is that when… either … we should go… immediately and directly.
And if we reflect on our own…we realize that he is teaching us that how we treat another amidst conflict... reflects how we honor them... whether we can be trusted to care for their good and not just our protection. It communicates whether they really matter to us. The key word is “go”... we are to go pursue setting things right.
Do you realize you have the power of initiative with some people who are afraid?
And finally...we see from Jesus... the power to...
4. Embody the reality of grace with our presence.
If we step back and look at this scene... it was loaded for Zacchaeus.
The scene was full of hatred.... animosity ... and judgment…and Jesus stepped into that space.
Imagine the significance of Jesus calling our Zacchaeus….and then announcing he would be coming over for lunch.
Imagine what it communicated to everybody.
In essence... Jesus stepped into the line of fire... he brought the power of his presence into the space of judgment. [8]
And isn’t this was Jesus was doing so often.
He was accused of being a friend of sinners…. because he didn’t join in practice of one group condemning another. It was the space he was standing in.
When a woman was brought before him who had been caught in adultery.
When those who were disabled or diseased were shinned… or children told to be quiet… or a Samaritan woman deemed ethnically unclean.
It could lead some to think Jesus was either ignoring their sin... or ignorant of it.
The presence of Jesus was never one of ignorance…but of insight… he didn’t see less… he saw more.
He didn’t worry about condoning their behavior…because he wasn’t.
Never with the slightest compromise of his own righteousness
In fact what spoke volumes was that he never saw these moments as a podium to speak about tax collecting... prostitution... because the point was not that he didn’t see the outworking of sin…but that he saw more than sinners for whom shame was the good news.
Some may recall that when he spoke to the Samaritan woman who had come out in the middle of the day to get water at the nearby well...
She said… “how is it that you a Jew speak to me a Samaritan… and a woman?”
She’s saying “Don’t you see me like everyone else?”
Are you just ignorant ...unaware of what I have done?
Jesus would answer that by asking her to go get her husband. And that opened up her heart to know that he saw so much... yet he didn’t simply reject her.
It was always clear if one looked… that Jesus was not PARTICIPATING in the behaviors of others…nor was he giving PERMISSION to the behaviors of others…. He was simply being present with such people.
(When I came to a point of stopping some use of substances… I knew I needed to establish a real break for a while… it wasn’t a judgment on others… but a need to judge my own susceptibility to to become comfortable in such social settings without sharing in that aspect. In time I could bring my presence ….and similarly I think we may need time to become free of participation….and clear in not communicating some false message of permission or affirmation.)
What we can learn from Jesus … is that our willingness to be present with those who presume judgment… can speak of seeing more.
Jesus risked his own reputation. In a world in which people rarely defy the obvious power of social reputation... Jesus showed the power to be trusted to serve the interest of others more than his own social interests.
If we want to love others like Jesus... we will have to grow in being trustworthy... of being those who won’t just serve our social status... who will come be with someone who our friends may look down upon.
Are we someone who someone can share their fears and failures with...and know that we won’t use it to serve our personal gain?
This is essential to becoming safe people.
So we do well to embrace the power of our presence. We may need to enter the space of grace.
CLOSING
That day… so many people couldn’t fully see. When someone saw more… someone came down from a tree….
I believe that each of us have a desire to help people come down from hiding in the trees... where they hope nobody will see them.
The exchange with Zacchaeus is unique in some respects… people aren’t looking at us as the potential Messiah… they may not be so quick to receive us... or to change.... but it DOES capture what this world needs. It captures how we can grow in loving like Jesus.
it speaks to how others experience us.
It speaks to how approachable we are… how safe we are.
I imagine that there is someone in each of our lives….who we can help come down from a tree… out of the place of not feeling safe in how we see the.
Is there someone in your life that may need to know that you see more than others see…. More than they can see? Are there people in your life that need to experience that you are safe?
And how about ourselves? Do we know that we can come down.
I want to offer all of us a short prayer that has been serving me to take hold and stay ahold of life in God.
God, I belong to you.
May your will become my will.
May your love become my love.
Resources:
I shaped this series based on my own ideas about what are the most identifiable and impactful principles and patterns we can identify in the way that Jesus loved. I am indebted to Les Parrott for the way he presented that premise itself, from Ephesians 5:1-2, in his book Love Like That.
Notes:
1. This is similarly expressed in John 3:17-18 (NIV) ?“For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. 18 Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because he has not believed in the name of God's one and only Son.”
2. Isolation is becoming increasingly a part of reported feelings. And it is also found to be deeply painful to the human soul. Purdue University... did research on the effects of exclusion... using an online game with three playing ...passing a ball...and when two players began to leave the third out...the physical response was a reaction in the brain... that paralleled that of physical pain.
Kipling Williams, professor of psychological sciences, studies how ostracism hurts individuals as much or even more than a physical injury
Ostracism or exclusion may not leave external scars, but it can cause pain that often is deeper and lasts longer than a physical injury.
"Being excluded is painful because it threatens fundamental human needs, such as belonging and self-esteem," Williams said. "Again and again research has found that strong, harmful reactions are possible even when ostracized by a stranger or for a short amount of time." here
They also studied exclusion in the workplace... and found “out-of-the-loop” participants experienced incompetency, anger and sadness. here
3. For more exploration of religion vs Jesus, see 9 Reasons Jesus Hates Religion (And You Should Too) By Frank Powell - here
4. These words echo a truth that God had imparted throughout the Scriptures.
Proverbs 31:9
Open your mouth, judge righteously, defend the rights of the poor and needy.
1 Samuel 16:7
But the Lord said to Samuel, “Do not look on his appearance or on the height of his stature, because I have rejected him. For the Lord sees not as man sees: man looks on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart.”
James 2:1-5
My brothers, show no partiality as you hold the faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory. For if a man wearing a gold ring and fine clothing comes into your assembly, and a poor man in shabby clothing also comes in, and if you pay attention to the one who wears the fine clothing and say, “You sit here in a good place,” while you say to the poor man, “You stand over there,” or, “Sit down at my feet,” have you not then made distinctions among yourselves and become judges with evil thoughts? Listen, my beloved brothers, has not God chosen those who are poor in the world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom, which he has promised to those who love him?
5. This is developed well in This article citing: Chapter 21 of The History of the Love of God, Volume II – A Love More Ancient than Time
6. Brennan Manning, The Ragamuffin Gospel: Good News for the Bedraggled, Beat-Up, and Burnt Out
7. Now there are many occasions in which someone was on the side of the road and calling out...and Jesus simply heard their cry. But even then... he took the initiative to stop and engage them.
8. Father Gregory Boyle who has worked with the gangs of Los Angeles for 20 years, speaks of entering this space, when he writes,
“Inching ourselves closer to creating a community of kinship such that God might recognize it. Soon we imagine, with God, this circle of compassion. At the edges, we join the easily despised and the readily left out. We situate ourselves right next to the disposable so that the day will come when we stop throwing people away. You stand with the least likely to succeed until success is succeeded by something more valuable: kinship. You stand with the belligerent, the surly, and the badly behaved until bad behavior is recognized for the language it is: the vocabulary of the deeply wounded and of those whose burdens are more than they can bear. If there is a fundamental challenge within these stories, it is simply to change our lurking suspicion that some lives matter less than other lives.” - Father Gregory Boyle
Gregory Boyle, Tattoos on the Heart: The Power of Boundless Compassion. Father Gregory Boyle’s sparkling parables about kinship and the sacredness of life are drawn from twenty years working with gangs in LA.
