Peter’s account of Jesus told through the book of Mark includes a story where Jesus and his followers are at a synagogue watching individuals give financial gifts. They had watched as several rich individuals had thrown large amounts into the offering collection. In contrast, a poor widow came and put in two small copper coins worth only a few cents. To the casual observer, it was a paltry comparison to the gifts of the others.
But not from Jesus’ perspective. Seizing the opportunity for a profound life lesson, Jesus called his followers to him to point out that the widow’s gift was the most sizable and significant because it represented everything she had to live on, while the large gifts were an insignificant portion of the abundance of the givers.
Perspectives.
We are so advanced at messing them up. So quick to judge or draw conclusions based on what we know, what we perceive, what we’ve experienced. What works for us.
Stephen Covey in the best seller “The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People” lists “Seek first to Understand and Then to be Understood” as the fifth habit. We read that and respond, “of course.” Yet we still naturally fixate on being heard and pushing our perspectives forward before we ever, if ever, take time to understand the context of our conversation or impact of our actions. We rush in unaware of what we are saying, or asking. Truth be told, we mostly don’t want and don’t care to know.
When I was young, my father was the president of a hospital in Central Texas. The hospital at that time also ran the EMS/ambulance service for the county. Dad and the EMS professionals had come to an impasse in contract negotiations and the EMS team had gone out on strike. I was too young to know or appreciate the details of the deadlock but I was old enough to know that my dad was now serving as the ambulance driver, along with other hospital executives, which I thought was pretty cool.
During that short-lived strike, we would sometimes get a brief description of the event after a run was done and, on occasion, a lesson. To this day I wear boots or at least heavy shoes while mowing, a lesson learned from a severely injured foot dad had witnessed.
But one day, my dad showed up back home ashen faced. He had been the driver to a crash on I-35. Not only were there fatalities, there was a gruesome cleanup of what amounted to human roadkill smeared on the roadway. The strike was settled the next day and I presume the EMTs were met more than half way.
Walking in their shoes. Mary Lathrap in her 1895 poem “Judge Softly” introduced this often quoted yet misattributed prose:
Just walk a mile in his shoes
Before you abuse, criticize and accuse.
If just for one hour, you could find a way
To see through his eyes, instead of your own muse.
Knowing the difficult contribution the EMT team was making for its community – not just theoretically but through personal, shoe walking experience – changed everything.
Intentions good.
Perspectives profoundly messed up.
No clue as to the value of two copper coins.