Interesting or Interested
Be Interesting
Leola has spent her life trying to find ways to become interesting to people because she felt so invisible. She spent a lot of time training herself to be a good speaker. She joined Toastmasters. She spent a lot of time trying to look just right so her cloths wouldn’t stand out before her brilliance. She spent a lot of money. She gave herself completely to be interesting to people so they would talk with her, hear her, and see her. Today, it just all seems so silly because today she finds herself under the orders of God to be quiet, hide and be in secret with Him. Stop investing in being interesting. This was a blow to Leola. She doesn’t like to be in the background. She likes to be seen and she has done some pretty drastic things to get in front. Some of those things have even been an embarrassment to her. The levels she would stoop for attention brought her to her knees. At one of those despicable levels put her is such disgust with herself that God was finally able to get to her. Stop!
She stopped and began a long stint of loneliness. Is it going to be just her and God forever? How can she be interesting to God? He is the one who created the whole world. How can she top that? Leola has been alone now for many years to ponder her relationship with God and to modify her relationship with people. Now, she doesn’t think this forced loneliness was any different than the loneliness she felt with people. He has asked her to make changes to benefit other people when she comes in contact with them rather than feed her need to be seen. She cries today to think of the things she has said and done to be seen after professing to be a God loving person. What kind of model for Christianity has she been? She has been so much more interested in herself than anyone else. How does SHE look? What should SHE do? How can someone who serves themselves all the time be interesting? The antics Leola had been performing have made her less interesting not more.
I had convinced myself that becoming interesting was for others. Who would like a boring person around them? All work and no play made Kathleen a dull person but all play made her a disgrace. There was so many things I had done to become visible to people. I tried to get into the “right” crowd with the “popular” people, and the “known” ones. None of that worked because God had other plans for me. He was training me to want Him, see Him, and follow Him. He was not popular in His day nor was He with the kind I was trying to hang with either. Oh, they said they were Christians, but their behaviour was far from it. Their behaviour looked pretty much like mine. You know the behaviour that disgusts me after the fact especially when it doesn’t get me to where I want it to get me. Two mighty blows in one second.
Be Interested
Less interesting is not where Leola wants to be. She has spent a lot of time pining for popularity, fixing for friends and acting for accolades. This is what she knows. She doesn’t know how to keep silent, make herself invisible and preserve secrets. She is an extrovert who loves being an extrovert. She loves talking to new people. She loves talking. Leola is interesting according to God but she has to learn now to be interested. There is a way God wants her to speak. There is information God wants her to seek. She has spent most of her life seeking for her own sake now she has to learn to seek for another’s sake, to listen. She needs to seek information about them to make them feel visible, heard and loved by Jesus. Who better to do the job than a person who feels the opposite most of the time? Leola knows exactly how degrading it is to feel invisible and the last thing she wanted to do was turn the tables to make others feel visible while she remains invisible. For her to help anyone she needs to listen to what they have experienced. How will she know unless she hears it from them? Leola knows people want to be interesting but more so they want her to be interested in them. Being interested in people is exactly where God wants Leola to be. It isn’t about hiding herself from people it is putting them before herself in all subjects.
Jesus did not hide from anyone but sometimes he makes us hide from people because we are not suited to represent Him. I was not suited to represent Him because I wanted to be interesting to people. My interests were self-serving and there is nothing I personally can do for anyone. It is Jesus who does everything. He draws people to Himself and blesses us with being with Him. He teaches people how to live and allows us to tag along. It is Jesus who is interesting but some people don’t know that. How will I get that information to them if I am the one striving for their interest? I am only interesting for the short time I am with them. Jesus is with them 24/7. How can anyone or I deprive them of the interesting things Jesus did and said by talking about myself all the time instead of Him! I want to be interested in your life more than be interesting to you. When I talk, let my words direct you straight to the most interesting Man in the world, Jesus.
Meditation Reading this Week: Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.
