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One day when meeting with a friend, we were interrupted when someone needed her attention. She looked at me and said, “Hey, can you walk to the lobby with me?”
“Why?” I asked.
“Because this person is a little hostile,” she explained.
I agreed to help and walked with her to the lobby to meet this hostile person. I stretched out my hand, said hello and introduced myself. The guest wouldn’t shake my hand, stared me down and said, “This is confidential.” So I walked far enough away to still offer safety but not hear the conversation, and waited for my friend.
After the guest left, my friend approached me with her head down in shame, and began to offer apologies on behalf of the guest, for she had forgotten that person was an avid racist.
At first I thought, “How could you forget that!? That was so embarrassing!” Then my friend informed me she had brought a white male friend with her to offer protection with this same person the previous week. She had simply forgotten the character of this guest, and was sorry for that.
In that moment, I realized my friend saw my friendship before she saw my color. She had asked me to come with her to offer protection. She wasn’t unaware of my color, but she saw me as a friend first.
There is no such thing as being racially “colorblind,” nor is the phrase “Love is blind” true. Love enhances our vision. The eyes of love see past the exterior and see the interior. The eyes of love look past the flesh. The eyes of love see the heart.
Remember when choosing David to be the next king, the LORD reminded Samuel that He looks at humans through the eyes of love?
But the LORD said to Samuel, “Do not consider his appearance or his height, for I have rejected him. The LORD does not look at the things people look at. People look at the outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the heart." – 1 Samuel 16:7 (NIV)
Let us ask the LORD for those same eyes.