I was walking my dog on a trail in Burlington last week and at the side of the trail I saw this pair of sneakers. It got me wondering…what is the story behind these sneakers? Why are they here?
I could understand if a sole sneaker was dropped at the side of the road (pun intended), but a pair? What happened?
My mind wandered.
Perhaps it had started raining and the person decided to change into boots and left these behind….
Or perhaps they were being carried in a backpack and fell out.
Or was there a nefarious reason? Maybe someone was kidnapped as they were hiking and left these sneakers as a clue for loved ones to find! (My mind sometimes goes to a darker place when I’m hiking alone 😊 ).
It struck me that I’ll probably never learn what happened. I’ll never know the full story.
And isn’t that also true of most of the people we meet in our daily lives? We will never know their full story. We see bits and pieces and we try to put together a narrative about them based on what we know – but for most people we encounter, we learn only a part of the whole.
Periodically a meme circles around social media which points this out. It typically says something like, “You never know what someone is going through. Be kind. Always.”
The letter to the Ephesians says it this way: “Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you.” (Ephesians 4:32)
We don’t know the full story. Be kind, tenderhearted, and forgiving as God is with us.
In Christ,
Pastor Jen