New Glasses

It was a program for delinquent youth—kids who struggled in school, who struggled with rules, authority, and relationships. They just struggled. Rather than throwing them in juvie, they would get an ankle monitor and report to the program every day after school. The youth lived life together with healthy supervision. They would shop and prepare meals for supper, work on homework, find constructive outlets, and perform community service together. They came to our mentoring program at HorsePower once a week, where they helped with chores around the barn and then got to spend one-on-one time with a Christian mentor and a horse.

The worker that brought them was amazing. She was so good with the kids. You could tell they just loved her—but she also had their respect. I realized she could be a valuable resource. After all, I didn’t know what I didn’t know! I asked if she would be willing to meet for coffee. I would learn a lot from her . . .

We started by sharing a little bit about ourselves. I admitted that I was at a bit of a disadvantage because I did not come from "hard." I had been blessed with a loving and supportive family, even if far from perfect. And I always had everything I needed, even if I struggled with defining wants and needs. I told her that I wanted to learn and understand more. As I finished my little litany, her response was complimentary—but not. She said, “It’s so refreshing to see someone who wants to actually live out what they believe!”

It caught me off guard and really made me think. It was kind of a compliment to me—this new me. Yet a harsh indictment of the old me—the not-too-far-in-the-past me—the me that still seemed to keep cropping up more often than I would like. It was a harsh indictment from her on the church. And I don’t think she meant just Christians. How many profess a faith or a religion yet fail to really practice what it preaches?

She went on to share a little bit about her background. She was half white, half Native American. Her father was Catholic and had gone to do mission work on one of the reservations. He ended up getting her mother, a young woman from the tribe, pregnant. He did not marry her or stay on the reservation. He took the child from her mother back to his home in New York. She had been raised, brown-skinned yet freckled, in an all-white community. She would spend time on the reservation in the summers and stood out in that world, too. She bridged two cultures, sadly not knowing to which she really "belonged." Her father and his family professed the Catholic faith, while her mother and her family still practiced some Native American traditions and rituals. As for her, she seemed disinclined to affiliate with either. "Religion" hadn’t served her well.

On the reservation, she would hear stories of how her parents and grandparents had been ripped from their families and sent to boarding schools. Far too many of them would be emotionally, physically, and sexually abused by priests and nuns, supposed ambassadors of Christ. They were punished for speaking their native language or practicing their native religion. It's hard to imagine how this won very many true converts . . .

She shared some insights into the native culture, telling a story of visiting the reservation and spending time with her grandmother. She went on to say that her grandma had such gray hair that it was almost white, and she wore it in this crazy hairdo. As an inquisitive young child, she found herself staring at that white hair worked up into an ornate, messy bun. Her grandma proceeded to, quite literally, poke her in the eyes! In Native culture, it was disrespectful to stare at an elder. You showed respect by lowering your eyes in submission to their authority. She didn’t stare at her grandmother’s hair after that—or any elder.

It was thought-provoking because I had just been wondering if she was even interested in what I had to say because she seldom looked at me as I spoke! And it explained so much about many of the kids we worked with. I thought you were expected to look your elders in the eye as they spoke to you as a sign of respect or attention. So, what I had perceived as disinterest, or even rebellion, in the young Native Americans that had come to the mentoring program at HorsePower was likely just the opposite!

This was such an aha moment. It served almost as a key, unlocking the realization that we must be careful not to make assumptions about what others are feeling or thinking. Truly, each of us has a pair of glasses through which we see the world. The lens is shaped by our culture, upbringing, personality, experiences, beliefs. I realized that this eye contact was just one of many different things that I probably misunderstood about these kiddos because we had such different lenses through which we viewed the world.

She told me how hard it was for these kids she was bringing to trust "nice." On their way out to HorsePower, she would tell the new kids, “Now, when we get to the barn, these ladies are going to be really nice. And they really are nice! You can trust them.” She went on to tell me that, in their young lives, the only people that were nice to them wanted something in return. They had no idea of genuine kindness! It was unfathomable to me. Again, such a different lens.

I don't know if we can ever really take off our glasses, but the realization that we need to try to see through the eyes of others once in a while was such an eye-opener for me (pun intended!). I want new glasses, maybe like those transition lenses that change as you move from sunlight to indoors—glasses that would help me understand the people I am sent to. Not to shift truth but to understand what someone else might perceive through their lens. Just as the Apostle Paul became “all things to all people . . . [to] save some,” I want to be more understanding of everyone God puts me in contact with so that I might be more effective and have more spiritual impact. Maybe that’s what the Holy Spirit does for us. Lord, give me Spirit eyes to see what human eyes can’t see.

“Whoever says, ‘I know him,’ but

does not do what he commands

is a liar, and the truth is not in

that person. . . . Whoever claims to

live in him must live as Jesus did.”

1 John 2:4, 6 NIV

“Do not merely listen to the word,

and so deceive yourselves.

Do what it says.”

James 1:22 NIV

“The precepts of the LORD are right,

giving joy to the heart.

The commands of the LORD are

radiant, giving light to the eyes.

Psalm 19:8 NIV

“Open my eyes that I may see

wonderful things in your law.”

Psalm 119:18 NIV

“I pray that the eyes of your heart may

be enlightened in order that you

may know the hope to which he has

called you, the riches of his glorious

inheritance in his holy people,

and his incomparably great

power for us who believe.”

Ephesians 1:18–19 NIV

“I have become all things to all

people so that by all possible

means I might save some.”

1 Corinthians 9:22 NIV