Bruised Apples…

I got this in my email inbox this morning. Perhaps you’ve already read it, but I wanted to share it, because it’s so thought provoking.

Once, 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 of them, that is, except one. He paused, took a deep breath, 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, and asked one of them to call his wife and explain that he was taking a later flight. Then he returned to the terminal where the apples were all over the 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 as she helplessly groped for her spilled produce. The crowd swirled about her; no one stopping and no one caring about 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 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.

“I hope we didn’t spoil your day too badly,” he added.

As the he turned to walk away, the bewildered blind girl called out to him. “Mister…”

He paused and turned to look back into those blind eyes.

“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 in his soul. Are you Jesus?

What about me? Do people mistake me for Jesus? That’s my desire – that I can show the world who Jesus really is. And I suppose that’s showing the world who the Father is, since Jesus said that’s what He came to do!

As the email went on to say, this is our destiny… to be so much like Jesus that a world that is blind to His love, life & grace cannot tell the difference.

Are you Jesus?