What I have learned in review: Presence Reveals Judgement
Note: If you are unfamiliar with my term “experiment”, this quick read will add a lot of context. Post: Starting Over with the Game of Minutes
Lately I have been conducting less experiments but gaining more understanding.
A few weeks ago, I started conducting time studies at a different store. With changing to a new store, came new people with new personalities. Changing stores brings new barriers to cross over relationally as I would imagine that a “guy from corporate” coming to “analyze everything you do” is as daunting as it sounds.
On Tuesday, I worked with Roger** a tenured associate who I had not met before. If I am honest, being with Roger for my full shift was very challenging. As a representative of the Store Support Center, I am often met with either fear or a load of complaints and strong feelings. Roger shared a range of complaints and comments about the state of the company. He started with the company over a decade ago, and I am assuming that I gave him a listening ear that he had wanted for some time.
As I spent time with Roger, and as he shared more, I started to…..
I wish I could say that I started to love him more and more as a person. Or that I started to see his immense value as a Son of God. Or I wish I could share that I saw the gold in him and was prepared to speak that over him.
Unfortunately, I started to see him as an annoyance.
Was he annoying me with his constant negative feedback? Yes! Did it bother me that he turned into an overbearing salesman with customers? Absolutely! Did either of these things make him any less valuable in the Kingdom of God? NO!
It was not until I stopped to pray that I realized I was judging him and labeling him as something other than who he really was. It was the fact that I labebeled him as an “annoyance” that made me realize I was in deep sin right there in the middle of my workday. The sin didn’t come from being annoyed by him, it came from labeling him as something other than what is true about him.
In that moment, as I stoped to pray, God gave me the amazing gift of awareness as to how I was seeing this co-worker! Immediately, the ideas I had learned in The Divine Conspiracy came to mind. Here are some of the quotes that the Holy Spirit was bringing to my attention, as He convicted of my sin:
“But contempt is a greater evil than anger and so is deserving of greater condemnation. Unlike innocent anger, at least, it is a kind of studied degradation of another, and it also is pervasive in life than anger. It is never justifiable or good. Therefore Jesus tells us, ‘Whoever says “Racca” to his brother shall stand condemned before the Sanhedrin, the highest court of the land.’ (Matthew 5:22)”
“The intent and the effect of contempt is always to exclude some-one, push them away, leave them out and isolated.”
The Divine Conspiracy: Rediscovering Our Hidden Life in God by Dallas Willard
What a gift I received in that moment! I could have gone the rest of that day, or week, or even lifetime with a false view of my co-worker. I could have been blinded to the truth of God’s love for him, and I could have continued to sin against God by trying to separate from one of His sons. Instead, I was given the opportunity to repent (or change my ways) and align my view with God’s view!
What does all of this mean for you?
- Catch Your Thoughts – Sometimes we are not even aware of how our thoughts about a situation shape our view of people.
- Separate Event Thoughts from Person Thoughts – When we have thoughts about people, sometimes they go past the event, and are concerning identity.
- See The True Person – Anytime we think of another’s identity, we are either building the Kingdom of God (KOG) or deforming it.
- Pray Often – Watching the KOG “come onto Earth as it is heaven” is a lot easier when we are stoping to pray!
A Pastor Who Is Ahead On The Journey
For months, I have had the book, Present Perfect in my saved later section on amazon. I finally decided to purchase the book, and I am so thankful that I did. Pastor Gregory has been on this same journey for decades and I look forward to learning from and applying his wisdom. This book helped me on my path towards practicing the presence, and I couldn’t recommend it enough!
*The book link on this page are affiliate links; meaning, I earn a commission on qualifying purchases made through them (at no extra cost to you).*
**The man’s name was not Roger. I will never share a person’s name without their consent.
Ok, so now I’m “caught up” with your posts. Here’s what I love most about this one:
“Catch Your Thoughts – Sometimes we are not even aware of how our thoughts about a situation shape our view of people.”
I believe this is HUGE and falls right in line with II Corinthians 10:5 “We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.”
At the moment we veer off course, we’re opening up a huge window of opportunity, but it’s the wrong kind of window and the worst kind of opportunity! For me, I’m trying to focus on replacing the lies of the enemy (I’m a loser, no one cares, this person is annoying, we don’t have a chance, etc. SO many lies) with the truth of God’s Word (You are a child of God, you are loved, this person you see as annoying is my precious son/daughter, You aren’t counting on My strength in this situation).
As I am working on my anxieties and all the thoughts associated with them, I’m in a constant battle to take those thoughts captive and replace them with God’s truth. It’s a similar focus as your experiment because the end result is the same: turning to God first and foremost in the midst of our daily life. And all of it needs to be bathed in prayer.
Thanks again for sharing your heart publicly. I’m praying that more and more people will be blessed by not only what you’re doing in your day to day life with your focus on God, but also by this blog.