Ellie’s eyes are so bad. Her ears work perfectly fine, but she does have a bad case of “selective hearing.” She gets it honest. Obviously from her dad. 😉 Her nickname is “Helen Keller” because home girl can’t see and sure doesn’t listen well. (Another reason I’m Mom-of-the-Year again this year.)
But, truly, her eyes are so bad. The first time I took her to the eye doctor, I didn’t really think she had an eye issue, but the folks at school sent her home with a letter thinking she might. As soon as she brought that letter home, all I heard was, “I want glasses! I want glasses!” She didn’t care about seeing; she just cared about accessorizing!
The day we went to the optometrist, you would have thought it was her birthday, as excited as she was. The doctor was so kind to us as she sat up in the chair. He had her cover her left eye. The line read ZBDHG. My daughter slowly spoke “T…K…L…R…4?” The next like read JELSJ. Ellie shouted, “That says Level.” I got all over her for fudging the test just so she could get glasses. I apologized to the optometrist. They both looked at me like a deer in the headlights. “Let’s try one more time,” the optometrist said. The line read BSJWE. Ellie didn’t say anything. He said, “It’s okay if it’s not perfect. Just tell me what you see. So she said, “G…um…I don’t know what the others are.” My kid really couldn’t see. She wasn’t fudging the system at all. She really couldn’t see.
A lot of times as Christians, we convince ourselves that we are following in God’s footsteps when we take on tasks that only He is capable of handling. One of those tasks is the ability to know someone else’s intentions. We read verses like Psalm 6:16-19 that talks about the six things that God hates and hone in on verse 18 believing that it’s our responsibility to stop people who have intentions that lead to making evil plans to do evil. But flipping a book over, we see in Psalm 44:21 that only God can see the secrets of the heart. We don’t have the power to know other people’s intentions, so we can’t make judgments of if their motives for why they do what they do are good or bad.
Paul says that we’ve all been given different gifts. If someone’s gift is to lead singing really well, he will want to lead singing as much as he can for the glory of God. I can’t assume that his intent for leading singing is to be seen by everyone in the congregation. Or what about someone whose gift is cooking really well? I can’t assume that that person’s ability to bake four dozen donuts for the after worship brunch is to produce compliments for everyone to shower her with after the meal.
Suppose someone has used their gifts with a negative intent previously. Isn’t it normal to assume that if they do it once, they’ll do it again? No. I’ve seen so many people that have come before the church asking for prayers multiple times in a year with the response of people saying, “I forgave them once, but I’m not forgiving them over and over just so they can get attention.” They assume their intent to ask for forgiveness is faulty considering their record. Sometimes, people may even get angry when the more “naive” people at the church buy into that person’s brokenness and waste prayers on their soul.
But listen to how The Message translation puts Romans 12:17-19. “Don’t hit back; discover beauty in everyone. If you’ve got it in you, get along with everyone. Don’t insist on getting even; that’s not for you to do. “I’ll do the judging,” says God. “I’ll take care of it.”
I tried to judge Ellie’s intentions, and I ended up being in the wrong. Did Ellie get glasses? Yup. Did the song leader and pot luck champ get compliments? Yup. And all of those people enjoyed those blessings. But there is no way of knowing their intentions for their actions. I can’t see their heart; only their actions.
If you struggle with assuming other people’s negative intentions, I encourage you to pray for a softer heart and work on seeing value in them. Before you start your day, name that person out loud and say one positive quality that that person has. If their heart desires lead to evil intent, that’s not your problem. “I’ll do the judging. I’ll take care of it.” -God (Romans 12:17-19)
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