It's All Relative

Recently, we got an insurance settlement that enabled us to replace the floors in 75% of our house that previously had old, damaged, pink tile.  I have never liked that tile.  Combine the age and the relentless West Texas dirt and wind, it was just hard to keep clean.  I would find myself complaining about it from time to time throughout the years and then almost immediately be reminded of the sweet ladies in Mexico who sweep their dirt floors in their one room houses each day.  My discomfort is only relative to my prosperity.

It happens in a lot of areas if we stop and think about it.  I like watching home buying television shows, but when the family says, "Oh, we couldn't possibly get by without three bathrooms...granite counter tops....a pool..." I think, really?  Millions of people all over the world get by with a lot less than an out house.  Relative.

I don't think that having nice things or desiring beautiful things is bad.  I just think that we tend to measure what "need" by what we think we should have, not really what we actually need or even deserve for that matter.

This struggle comes out in me in non-materialistic ways too.  I have really found myself judgmental and envious of anybody I see recently with a baby.  They don't know me at all or what we're dealing with right now and yet I am secretly angry at them inside because they don't have to worry about the possibility of losing their child.  I read a blog the other day about a young mother facing a big disappointment in her life and I thought, "Big deal.  No one is telling you they might take your babies from you."  Yucky thoughts from my true heart.  More proof that I desperately need more grace and gentle transformation from my merciful Savior. 

But, in true merciful style, He is gentle when reminding me about all the mothers in the world holding babies carrying cancer and other diseases or the poor, sweet mothers carrying children in their womb they know will pass away shortly after birth.  How do they look at me laughing and playing with my little lambs and reconcile their situation?  It's all relative.

I don't know how to change the way this happens in me or anyone else.  I look to Jesus, the most sincere, kind, loving, strong and giving person to walk this earth.  I have to believe that because He was all God and all man, He knew from the moment He started His ministry (maybe earlier?) that He was going to die.  And yet, He spent three years pouring into ungrateful, shaky-faithed men and loving everyone He met with wild abandon.  I want to be like Him.  If I was Him, I would have been running around yelling at everyone, "You're hungry?! I'm going to die for YOU!  What do you think of that?!?!" Wise choice, God, on not making me the Savior of the world. 

My desires, prayers, wants, needs, hopes and dreams are all relative to where I live, what I have and really, who I am.  May I live each day remembering that circumstances do not define me, there are always others who are hurting more than me, and loving and giving my life for others makes looking like Jesus a little more relative to me.