Going Beyond the "Black and White"

Being a follower of Jesus Christ demands that we see the world beyond “black and white” certainty.  It asks us to enter into the gray. This past week, the movie industry lost another great actor (Philip Seymour Hoffman) to a drug overdose. At first glance, it would be easy to say that he was an addict and the consequences of his choices finally caught up with him. Yet, I have to admit, as I heard about his three children that he regularly walked to school, his real struggle with addiction for the last 25 years, and the constant fears that haunted him, I realized that the story went deeper. Obviously, there was a deep battle within him that most people had no idea was taking place.

Sometimes it is easier for us to stay in the “black and white” because it feels safer.  Life seems more contained. It offers easy, simple answers and it allows us to put people into neat categories and groups. We can make quick assessments and judgments. The problem is that it offers a certainty that covers up the truth. Too much “black and white” can limit our sight.

Jesus was a master of seeing into the gray. When he looked at a tax collector, a prostitute, or an adulterer, he realized that there was more to those people than appeared on the surface. When he talked to a disgraced woman at a well, Jesus saw a searching child of God, not a woman to be shunned. In fact, the Gospels often criticized the Pharisees (Jesus’ opponents) for seeing only the “black and white” and not going beneath the surface, seeing only what they wanted to see. 

So what if we looked at the people around us with a little more gray. I think it would change our lives and our relationships. What is the story behind the man holding the sign on the corner, or the person sitting across the table from you? What about the grouchy person behind you in line at the grocery store, or the co-worker that has an obsession to make it to the top? We never know what is going on beneath the surface or in the background. So, when we see with a little more gray, it opens up storehouses of compassion and grace … and it allows us to love a little more like Jesus. 

You are the hands and feet of Christ,

Brett