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A few
years ago a group of salesmen went to a regional sales
con-vention in Chicago . They had assured their wives
that they would be home in plenty of time for Friday
night's dinner. Well, as such things go, one thing led
to another. The sales manager went longer than
anticipated and the meeting ran overtime. Their flights
were scheduled to leave out of Chicago 's O'Hare
Airport, and they had to race pell mell to the airport.
With tickets in hand, they barged through the terminal
to catch their flight back home.
In their rush, with tickets and briefcases, one of these
salesmen inadvertently kicked over a table which held a
display of baskets 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 into the baskets, and helped set
the display up once more. 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 $20 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 wonde-red. 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. Let's start living like
we are worth the price He paid.
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