When you view everyone you meet thru the single, myopic lens of your favored injustice, you’re not viewing them as God’s children anymore. Eventually it’s not about the injustice, it’s about you—the wound you keep reopening, the hole you expect to fill by digging it deeper.
Even in his earthly ministry, our Lord looked upon the heart, one by one. Each person he met w/new eyes, as though no one had yet disappointed him. He looked for their pain & sought healing, he looked for sin & offered forgiveness, one by one. He does the same w/ each of us now.
Satan’s plan is the opposite: View entire populations w/ suspicion. Judge them by their faults, the faults of everyone around them, the faults of their progenitors, their progeny, & even by those with whom they have no association but share physical characteristics or heritage.
Satan must keep us distant & divided. He knows the strength of the love from whence our species sprang. He was born of it himself; he knows the hosts of heaven wept even for him when “the Son of the Morning” fell from grace. Love is our power. To win souls, he must snuff it out.
He must keep us from getting too close to one another. To see each other one by one, the eye contact of two beings of our holy nature, leads to compassion & mutual understanding. Any spark of it beneath the rancor is a threat.
So he forms mobs. Through our suspicions, fears, & ill judgment, he bids us create the horrors we suspect. Mob intimidation makes it much harder for us to approach just one & see his face & feel his spirit. We fall prey to “they” instead of “we,” blame instead of responsibility.
Said Christ, Cast the beam out of your own eye that you may see clearly to cast the mote out of your brother’s. Clear sight is antithetical to the devil’s divisions. He will tell you your brother’s mote is bigger than your beam, so you’ll drive in those faults & both go blind.
We are sons and daughters of the Most High being scattered from the fold & collected by enemies. The Shepherd loves each sheep. He mourns after & seeks after each sheep. To be like him, we must do likewise. We must break rank with the enemies & gather again to the Shepherd.
Put down your stones. Look at your neighbors one by one. Give them every benefit of every doubt. Let their sorrows move you. Let their triumphs mend you. Avow yourself to never belong to anything, in thought or deed, that does not have Christ at its head.
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