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BLIND SPOTS
It was just an ordinary, regular kind of day - that's how it started anyway. I spun my wheel and slowly steered the '73 Grand Prix - trusty rusty - into the parking lot of a quaint little Seattle restaurant where I was meeting an old friend for lunch. The day was grey and overcast but there was no rain. At almost noon I was a bit surprised to find that there were still plenty of parking spaces to choose from. I picked a slot next to one of those tall light poles with the concrete base and slid my car snugly in between the lines.
The conversation and lunch were pleasant. It is always a joy for me - catching up with old friends and of course - eating. I can't remember who paid the bill but by about 1:30 we were saying our goodbyes and getting into our cars to go back to our daily routines. I watched my friend drive out of the lot and gave one last wave and a smile and then began pulling my own vehicle forward. Not two seconds later - as I pointed the nose of my car toward the parking lot exit - I heard the most dreadful noise.
It was a mixture of a metallic-gargling sound - fingers on a chalkboard or the squeak of an old screen door all amplified through a my brain’s distorted loud speaker. Before I could blink, or gather my senses it was over - the damage was done. I had turned my vehicle into the concrete base of the light pole that I was parked next to and proceeded to scrape a two foot by eighteen inch swath out of my front passenger door. There was no turning back. No rewinding the clock. No “do-overs.” The deed was signed, sealed and delivered.
But how had it happened. Hadn’t I looked both ways and checked my mirrors? How could I have possibly missed that giant, concrete slab that had now tattooed a great big stupid sign on the side of my Grand Prix?
Let me ask you a question. When you were taking driving lessons, did your instructor ever talk to you about your cars “blind spot?” Yup, the sneaky, stealth light pole had somehow managed to position its ugly mug precisely in my blind spot.
After a brief moment of mild expletives (yeah, "mild" right!) I gathered my self control and thought about those people who work at airports - the ones holding up their illuminated flags - waving and guiding the monstrous 747 jets into their safe docking zone. “If only I'd had those flag wavers guiding me,” I thought, “This never would have happened.” “If only I had someone watching out for my car saying, Stop - Stop! Turn the other way. You don't see what you're about to do and how much damage it will cause."
But it was too late.
Isn't that the way we feel sometimes in our personal lives. Oops! Too late. We all have blind spots don't we. Things about ourselves - about our personalities that we, for whatever reasons, don't see. The truth is that if we don't have people around us that will be our “flaggers” we are bound to take a few scrapes and sometimes do some real damage to our lives - and possibly to the lives of those around us.
Jesus wants us to be in community with other believers so that they can be our "flaggers" - people who will tell us the Truth about what we don't see clearly in ourselves. He wants us to grow deep in those relationships with other believers so that when they need to speak in convicting love to us, we will listen - and trust Him through them. Likewise, when we see their "blind spot" God wants us to have the kind of relationship bridge with our friends that is sturdy enough to carry us cross to that place where we can alert them to the danger that they don’t see.
Don't get me wrong - I'm not talking about being judgmental or critical of other people - I'm talking about "watching out" for others and having the courage to lovingly confront and the maturity to be confronted.
There is a popular old phrase recently made new again by film and TV and commonly used in many circles and settings today. You may have heard it - it goes, "I've got your back." Wouldn't it be great if in community we had our Christian brothers and sisters..., and they had our "backs." This is, indeed, the will of our Lord.
Hebrews 3:13 (NIV)
Luke 6:41
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