Perspective
- Eric Crowley
- Dec 7, 2019
- 6 min read
It’s all about perspective.
As some of you know, I went back to the US for 4 months (July-October) to recuperate from some health issues (which is why I haven’t written a blog in ages). Thanks be to God, I’m doing much better now. And while I was home, I was able to get a lot of perspective.
It’s very quiet at my parent’s place. It is not very quiet in Cebu City. It’s very green and beautiful at my parent’s place. It’s not very green or beautiful in Cebu City. In fact, seeing a small patch of grass is almost worthy of writing home about. Before going back to the US, I was allowing myself to be dragged down by the noise, pollution, and general chaos of a city in the Philippines. But at home I was able to gain some perspective. I realized that beauty and peace do not only come to us from our external surroundings. More profoundly, they come from within. If we choose to allow the goodness of God to flood our being, to see His beauty in all things, then our external surroundings actually matter quite little. By living in a spirit of peace and gratitude, we are able to see the beauty around us, no matter where we are. Since returning to the Philippines, I catch myself focusing on the beauty and goodness around me, seeing all things as a gift from God. This brings with it greater peace and gratitude, even in the midst of chaos.
One of the places I’m able to see this beauty is in the poor. The poverty here in Cebu can be pretty horrendous: people literally living in heaps of trash, sewage, naked children running in the streets, families sleeping on a piece of cardboard. Sometimes I have found myself hardening my heart against it, getting caught up in all of my own “problems” and riding right past these people on my motorbike. I think one of the reasons for this is that I feel powerless to help, so I’d rather just ignore it.
There was one instance where I was leaving a restaurant with my roommate, and a poor woman came up the street, dragging her big bag full of plastic bottles that she had excavated from the piles of trash in the streets. She was standing right behind my motorbike. I walked over, put on my helmet, and went to start my bike. Then my roommate began talking to the woman. And I realized: I didn’t even see her. I literally looked right through her. As if she didn’t exist. I was so taken aback by this. We ended up inviting her in to the restaurant and buying her food. But I couldn’t shake the fact that I hadn’t seen her.
A few days later, at our weekly Bible study, we meditated upon a passage from Luke chapter 7 where a “sinful” woman comes and bathes Jesus’ feet with her tears. The Pharisee who invited Jesus to dine with him thinks: “If this man were a prophet, he would know who and what sort of woman this is who is touching him, that she is a sinner.” And Jesus says to him, “Do you see this woman?” He then goes on to forgive her sins and send her away in peace. But this phrase struck me: “Do you see this woman?” It brought me back to the encounter with the poor woman in the street. I felt Jesus saying to me: “Do you see this woman?” I began to reflect: Who are the people that I “don’t see” in my life? It’s not just the poor. It could be the person in my house who is really struggling, but I don’t have the time to ask them how they’re doing and listen to them. It could be my co-worker. Who do I “see through” in my life?
Since this experience, I’ve been much more intentional in “seeing” the poor. Every chance I get, I’ve been stopping to talk to them, listen, help them if I can, pray with them. Even if it’s inconvenient. I want them to know that they are seen. That they are worth seeing. More profoundly, I hope that through my small gesture they might experience that they are seen by God, who knows and loves them profoundly.
Through these encounters, I’m being reminded over and over again that we need the poor. They show us what it means to be human, to be simple, to rely on God, to be humble, to be generous. Ultimately, they show us our true nature: We are all poor, humble beggars before God. We are nothing without Him. We deserve nothing. All is gift. Everything. And what would we be if He took away everything? All that we have, all that we own, all of our talents and titles, the reputation that we’ve built up? What would we be if we had nothing? We would be the same. We would be His. We would be loved. We would be infinitely valuable, because Love Himself loves us.
I also experienced this very thing while I was home. Here in Cebu, I’m used to being “useful". I’m a missionary. I try to serve, first God and then others. I am busy with lots of different projects. When I was home in the US, I had no responsibilities, no one to serve. In a very real sense, I was “useless”. No one relied on me. It was very good for me to experience this, because I was able to see more clearly that I put a lot of my identity and worth in to what I’m able to do: that I can help people, that I can be useful to God by serving Him (which is a pretty huge joke…To be useful to God. As if He needs me to get anything done…). Without these occasions to do, I was left feeling useless. And in the midst of feeling totally useless, I still experienced God’s intense and personal love for me. And I realized again: God. Loves. ME. He doesn’t love me because of anything I can do. He doesn’t love me because I am good. He loves me because HE is good!
Being back in the busy-ness of missionary life, I have to constantly remind myself that my worth and identity do not come from service, from what I do. I am useless! And that’s fine! I come back each day to the feet of Jesus, offering myself and all my weakness, and hearing Him say: I love you. You are mine.
Perspective. This new-found perspective has prepared me to deal with some heavy difficulties that have come up recently in our mission. We minister to youth and young adults, and many of them suffer unimaginable tragedies. Just recently we’ve encountered a boy of 17 who lost both parents and is taking care of his 6 younger siblings; a girl of 15 who ran away from home and is living as a mistress with an older man; a young boy who resorted to prostituting himself to be able to help provide for his family; and an alarming increase in teens who share with us about suicidal thoughts and attempts. One of the young prostitutes that we minister to recently left her job on the streets, and some religious sisters were able to provide her with a scholarship to go back to school – only to find out weeks later that she has cervical cancer.
These situations seem dark, and at times hopeless. I need to keep going back to Jesus and remembering: Each of these people is good; each of these people is loved! Maybe no one else in their life is revealing this truth to them. I want to be one who does! Jesus, use me to reveal to Your little ones that You look upon them with such delight. That You thirst for their love. That You prepare a place for them beyond the darkness of this world where they will find rest. Use me, Jesus: Your broken, useless, scared, unsure, proud, judgmental, anxious, inadequate little one, to shine the smallest ray of Your light in to this darkness. Scatter the night, dispel the gloom, break the despair, and let Your peace prevail!
This is the hope of Christmas. As one Christmas hymn proclaims:
At hour of silent midnight, O mystery of love, Earth’s longed and sighed for Savior Descended from above; Awake, awake, creation! Arise, for Light has come.
And in the first chapter of the Gospel of John, we read:
The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it.
The true light, which enlightens everyone, was coming into the world.
And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us.
“The Lord is my light and my help; whom shall I fear!” proclaims Psalm 27.
Jesus, give us the perspective of Christmas! You came in the darkness of night. You came in utter weakness. There was no place for You in the inn. You were totally forgotten, rejected, surrounded by poverty, uncertainty. And it is here that You decided to allow Your light to shine for the first time in this world. Let Your light continue to shine in those dark areas of our lives, of our world. Use us, even in our weakness and brokenness, to shine a ray of Your light. Jesus, give us Your Christmas perspective.
May the Lord give you and your families His peace this Christmas,
Eric
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