Are you Jesus?

A few years ago a group of salesmen went to a regional
sales convention in Chicago. They had assured their wives
that they would be home in plenty of time for Friday night's
dinner. In their rush, with tickets and briefcases, one of these
salesmen inadvertently kicked over a table which held a display
of apples. Apples flew everywhere. Without stopping or looking
back, they all managed to reach the plane in time for their nearly
missed boarding.

ALL BUT ONE! He paused, took a deep breath, got in touch
with his feelings, and experienced a twinge of compassion for
the girl whose apple stand had been overturned.

He told his buddies to go on without him, waved good-bye, told
one of them to call his wife when they arrived at their home
destination and explain his taking a later flight. Then he returned
to the terminal where the apples were all over the terminal floor.

He was glad he did.

The 16-year-old girl was totally blind! She was softly crying,
tears running down her cheeks in frustration, and at the same
time helplessly groping for her spilled produce as the crowd
swirled about her, no one stopping and no one to care for her
plight.

The salesman knelt on the floor with her, gathered up the
apples, put them back on the table and helped organize her
display. As he did this, he noticed that many of them had
become battered and bruised; these he set aside in another
basket.

When he had finished, he pulled out his wallet and said to
the girl, "Here, please take this $40 for the damage we did.
Are you okay?" She nodded through her tears. He continued
on with, "I hope we didn't spoil your day too badly."

As the salesman started to walk away, the bewildered blind
girl called out to him, "Mister...." He paused and turned to
look back into those blind eyes. She continued,

"Are you Jesus?"

He stopped in mid-stride, and he wondered. Then slowly he
made his way to catch the later flight with that question burning
and bouncing about in his soul: "Are you Jesus?"

Do people mistake you for Jesus?

That's our destiny, is it not? To be so much like Jesus that
people cannot tell the difference as we live and interact with
a world that is blind to His love, life and grace.

If we claim to know Him, we should live, walk and act as He
would.

Knowing Him is more than simply quoting Scripture and going
to church. It's actually living the Word as life unfolds day to day.

You are the apple of His eye even though we, too, have been
bruised by a fall. He stopped what He was doing and picked
you and me up on a hill called Calvary and paid in full for our
damaged fruit.