Today's Thoughts...

Today’s Thoughts: Jesus says in the Gospel (John 8:12-20) today, “You judge by appearances….” Often our judgments of people are just based on appearances. It is either the color of their skin, their ethnic background, the language they are speaking, the clothing they are wearing, the god they believe in, the part of the world they come from that we use to decide who people are. We have not bothered to stop and talk with them or listen to their story or understand what they believe and value. We just judge them, we put them into a box from which they will never escape.
 
Jesus seems always to be judged by appearance by the religious leaders of his time. He cannot escape the box they have placed him in no matter what he does and says or how hard he tries. The problem is when people are judged in this way, those who do the judging lose. The religious leaders lose because they missed the presence of God in their life. God was standing in their midst and they didn’t see God.  God can be standing in our midst, perhaps not as dramatically as Jesus, but God is still presence in others and if we judge them by only appearance we lose.
 
Susanna (Daniel 13: 1-9, 15-17, 19-30, 33-62) was judged unfairly and what we learn from her story is that unfair judgments always catch up with those who do the judging. The truth always finds its way to the surface. It can be a difficult process and at times we need people like Daniel to point out the flaws in our judgment, but truth will always win even though it may take time, sometimes a life time.
 
As we go about our day let us not judge by appearance. Let us look for the truth, look for the presence of God in all we meet. Let us be guided by the Light of the world.
 
Have a great Monday everyone!