someone else's battle

Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a great battle. -Philo of Alexandria

Yesterday I made dinner for a family from church that I don't know. The woman, who has attended our church since childhood, has been caring for her grandmother who is in the last days of her life. Because I had overfilled my day, I had to call this woman and let her know I would have the meal to her house a half hour later than anticipated. I was a little taken aback by how short and unfriendly the woman sounded on the phone. I was making her a meal, afterall. I expected a little graditude or at least a friendlier tone.

After I mapped the address online, I put the meal in the car and took off. The family lived just 10 minutes south, but a world away. Every small house on the street was a duplex, nearly all badly neglected and needing repair. Windows were propped open with fans; beat-up cars lined the street; not a flower was in sight. I found the address and hustled up to the door. As I handed over the meal to a tired, sweaty, uncomfortable yet grateful woman, I wished I had done more. I wished that I had brought a better meal - the meal that I would have brought a beloved friend - and flowers, too. But more than anything, I wished I hadn't been so quick to judge. C.S. Lewis once postulated that the reason God called us not to judge is because we have no idea how far a person has come to be who they are. Only God knows the heart - and the circumstance and the history and the battles.

My cousin, whose husband is fighting cancer, recently told me how much differently she thinks about what people are going through. She'll be holding her one-year-old daughter in a store or on a soccer field and someone will comment on how cute she is and my cousin will think, "You have no idea. My husband has cancer. My life is not this perfect picture. You just don't know." None of us do.

And so I reconsider: The girl behind the register who isn't moving fast enough for me. The acquintance who's never satisfied with anything but seems to have everything. The woman who could have been just a little nicer on the phone. I can't begin to guess what anyone else's life is like, what their stuggles are, what crosses they bear. But, as I realized driving home from delivering my meal, tears falling, I can help make the burdens lighter. Not by withholding or judging or condeming. But by truly loving my neighbor, wherever, whoever and however they happen to be.